Hi there. I have been using premium alpaca for rooting my reborns and my latest lot is matting terribly, both the hank I am working with and the previously worked areas. Any suggestions on how to make the process easier would be most welcome. The hair is also very static charged and flyaway. So super soft though I want to keep using it.
Are you sure it is Suri? If you got huacaya, then it is going to do that no matter what. Either way, you can treat what you have with leave in conditioner.
I tend to buy raw hair and this is what I do to get it ready for rooting.
- Separate hair into locks.
- Wash locks individually in dish soap. Work soap in from cut end to tip.
- Fill a bowl with water and a splash of white vinegar. Set aside.
- Rinse each lock thoroughly and drop over the lip of your vinegar water bowl. Let them soak until you have rinsed them all.
- Rinse locks in water again and coat in leave-in conditioner. Let them sit as desired.
- Comb each lock. I use a series of combs to get finer and finer separation. For the finest hair, I bought a lice comb to use.
- Rinse locks carefully. You may want to use a bowl instead of the running water.
- Lay locks out to dry. Bundle and rubber and dry locks.
It basically takes a whole day, but the hair is less flyaway while also being nicely separated. While working a head, I use detangling spray and cling wrap. I keep the rooted hair covered to prevent it from rubbing.
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Wow, Liz! I didn’t know you process raw hair yourself! Your rooted babies always look awesome!
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Yeah, it is cheaper and some colors I was needing only came that way. Actually, most of my babies are rooted with Olga’s hair.
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'm glad you shared this cause I have a ton of mohair to process! I got discouraged after the first batch I tried to root was brittle and gross looking on my baby
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are you sure you are rooting it from the cut end? has your supplier started using different hair? I had that problem when rooting with very fine cheap alpaca and ruby red. tangled mess I had to keep spraying and combing. I also had that problem when it was long, made it harder to root.
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I had the same mess with Delta Dawn very fine mohair even if it rooted from the right end. Putting clear wrap around rooted area didn’t help me either, maybe I didn’t wrap it right, but it always moved for me.
What I end-up doing at the end is separate matted hairs with rooting needle and comb with water as I go.
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Thank you. Not sure of the brand as I got it from a reborn supplier here in Australia. I didn’t have the same trouble when I ordered from a different place last year but it took 3 months for them to get it to me from Poland.
Definitely rooting from the cut end. It seems to be this brand. I’ll preserve because it’s so beautiful and soft. Thanks.
I adore rooting with alpaca. So much softer and straighter than mohair. I haven’t had any problems with matting but you do have to watch out for hair plugs instead of single hairs. I haven’t ordered any for two years since I wasn’t reborning and I still have some. Just found out that Siri Hill (surihill.com) is no longer in business though. Now to find new supplier
I’m currently rooting with alpaca and used the same process that @Peachtree did. It is not static or matting up anymore.
You can sort of do this after rooting. Well, the conditioning part anyways.