Why would I avoid silicones in hair products?
Silicone / Silicon is able to form a seal around each hair shaft preventing anything being absorbed into the hair, and anything from getting out. This coating can be good in some ways, as it can protect from heat styling damage and humidity but just like if you use silicone face primers too often it can be very drying and can eventually cause your hair to become brittle.
The coating makes your hair very soft and silky but also devoid of any volume at all, leaving it hanging limp with zero volume. This can also make thin hair appear greasy. So if you hair is thick and coarse it can be a great benefit to use these products but if you hair is thin and limp like mine it will zap the life out of it.
Build up is another problem if you are using a silicone shampoo and conditioner, using it every day means that any moisturising products or masks won't be able to penetrate and moisturise the hair as it is coated in the silicone.
How do I know if silicone is in my hair product? Which are the worst? And why?
Water soluble silicones are the easiest to remove from your hair and cause the least build up so these are ok in moderation, non-water based silicones are worse as they actually need to be stripped of off the hair to clarify it.
Water based silicones - i.e. the ones that aren't as bad
Look out for the words:
dimethicone copolyol
lauryl methicone copolyol
hydroxypropyl polysiloxane
amodimethicone
Hydrolized wheat protein (I was interested in this as it's in some of my label.m products- it has a hazard level of 1 on the cosmetics database vs most of the above which are 2-3)
Ones that are not water based and are more harsh
trimethylsilylamodimethic
amodimethicone
phenyl trimethicone
dimethicone/ol
cyclomethicone
cyclopentasiloxane
trimethylsiloxysilicates
I am sure there are more but these are the ones I found after hunting the internet and my beauty books
There are many products that are silicone free such as The Body Shop which has a new range called Rainforest Moisture that are also free from SLS and parabens and are very reasonably priced and are frankly awesome. I was sent the Honey shampoo, conditioner and hair butter for dry hair but I have already repurchased (yesterday) and bought the detangling spray for coloured hair and another honey conditioner.
You can check the prices here The Body Shop Rainforest Moisture
They are currently doing a 'buy 1 get 1 half price'
The shampoo and conditioner cost £4.00 each
The hair butter costs £8.00
The detangler costs £6.00
The conditioner leaves your hair knot-free and smooth without that fake slippery feeling that silicone shampoos give. The butter is similar but like a super duper version and is a lovely consistency. You will seriously want to eat it (don't though)!
The detangling spray smells amazing, just like blueberries. I have only used it once so I will follow up on this one once I have used it a bit more.
NB. I am not writing this to make anyone feel bad or guilty in any way for what haircare they use, you might use Frizz Ease (full of silicones) every day and love it..this is just some info and a different perspective. I will be using these lovely products but I still have loads of 'naughty' products with chemicals to review and my stash of label.m products some of which do contain hydrolised wheat proteins and I don't think I can say that I will never use them again.
Credit to latina4u55.blogspot.com for some of the chemical names and Toxic Beauty book (which is my fave book right now) for some of the other chemical names. I ain't no scientist!
16 comments:
Very interesting.
My heavily bleached and very thick/coarse hair really needs some moisture-love. What would you recommend?
I've tried going silicone free, my dry knotty hair did not thank me for it and turned to straw. which is a shame really as I'd like to.
Thanks for this post, I've found it really interesting. I have a similar hair type to you and I have been finding that my hair is becoming more brittle, plus I'm pretty sure that most of the products I use have silcone in them, I might give that body shop stuff a try after your glowing review x
Thank you spool much for this post. My scalp has been soooo irritated lately, a hairdresser told me it could be the silicones and gave me a Kerastase shampoo to try, it doesn't have any silicones in it, score!
Although, bad news is, my lee stafford treatment for hair that doesn't grow past a certain length has Hydrolized wheat protein, boo... I'm sure it has more in it, but my eyes or memory just arnt fast enough! :p
I just had to throw out my conditioner as well... Ordered the Aveda clay conditioner though! so hopefully it'll work and my scalp will get back to normal, it feels like it's mildly sunburnt or somethin!! :( xx
I also hate the feel of silicones in my hair. I don't look at bottles to see if there's silicone in them or not, I go by how my hair feels. I've always hated Pantene and Fructis shampoos as they completely weigh my hair down, even the "volumising" ones!
Thanks, I must check out the new range from TBS - although my hair gets greasy really quickly so I'll be looking at the balance range!
Brilliant post, loved it. So informative I think I'm going to try this range as soon as my current shampoo / conditioner is gone!
So glad I read this post. Great explanation of silcons. Also I was tempted to try the rainforest range but held off because I haven't really heard/seen any reviews. Think it might be on the short list next time my products run out!
This is a great post! I always knew it was best to go silicone free but I wasn't well read as to why! :) Will check out the detangling spray definately! :) xx
@jaljen if you want silicone free then I would try the hair butter and the honey shampoo for dry hair. Also some argan oil from Melvita would be a good buy, a few treatments of that per week and I am sure your hair would be looking amazing in no time x
@Charlie the hair butter might work?x
@Laura no probs, Melvita will also be coming out with a sulphate and silicone free range soon too but the body shop ones will still be cheaper x
@Nikki no probs, I was actually told by a hairdresser that the Kerastese products 'do' contain silicones so best to check the ingredients hun x, I have that lee stafford treatment too so will be doing a review of the ingredients soo x
@Catriona some of them like the wheat and soy proteins you can't really tell from the feel probably as they are water soluble
@Dollface thanks hun mwah x
@Essjay23x definitely worth a punt! I love the smell of the honey products soo delish x
@scouselovesmakeup thanks, it's hard to find good info as the hair companies don't want you to know!
I absolutely LOVE The Body Shop & I am so excited that you got your hands on these! They don't come out in Oregon until Aug. 9th so I will be anxiously waiting.
It's a great thing to use products like this. Once I use up the hair products I have now, I will NEVER use ones with silicone, sulphates, colourants, or parabens in them ever again. It's a small price to pay for preserving the integrity of aquatic life.
Hey Sarah, I have just purchased the TBS banana shampoo and conditioner? it has lots of parabens in, is this bad for my hair and do you know if it is silicone free or not? thanks in advance and I will be trying out the honey shampoo after this review :)
I had a sample of the hair butter in a magazine and really liked it so bought two pots on the buy one, get one half price offer! I like the fact that it doesn't contain the parabens etc. Never really thought about the chemical elements until I started reading beauty blogs x
Very interesting!! I'm gonna check out my TBS for these products soon then!
Hopefully they're out in Canada!
http://xmaterialgirlsx.blogspot.com/
@creme cup = I don't know the ingredients so I don't know if it contains silicone but you could check them against that list I posted, parabens are preservatives but they have been linked to cancer, so have many other things but I still try and avoid them if possible just in case. If you want to try the paraben/silicone free range instead why not take it back and see if you can exchange x
It took me weeks to experience the benefits of silicone-free hair, the time until my hair recovered was awful! First, my hair turned dry and dull but after a while of using organic shampoos and masks it recovered and by now it's softer than ever!! I really loathe the fact that the industry deliberately puts bad substances like silicons into their products- just because it's cheaper for them :(
You 're so right about silicone, here it's very common in salons to recommend and use silicone drops to finish off a look, but it does cause dry ends especially if you use it constantly (what I 've been doing in the last 10 years - huge mistake)!
I 've only recently caught on to that (having finished numerous bottles of that thing) and dare I say, my ends aren't as bad as they used to...!
We all need to stay more informed!
Excellent post Sarah!
x
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