Natural Hair

Kiddies Hair

When it comes to kiddie hair, there’s a lot of similarities with adult hair. Kids’ hair can be long or short, dyed or curled, thick or thin, low porosity or high porosity. Their hair is just as diverse as yours!

However, there’s a major characteristic which is shared between all children between the ages of 0 and 10. When you look at a newborn baby’s hair, have you noticed that it’s a lot softer and thinner than adult hair? That’s because their strands are pretty different from ours. Babies are born with vellus hair: strands which are thin and soft as a result of not being connected to the sebaceous gland, the gland that produces sebum which coats and lubricates the hair. Vellus strands are a lot more fragile than our normal, adult, terminal hair, so it’s especially important to make sure you’re taking care to gently oil and lubricate your child’s hair to strengthen it. 

Vellus hair gradually sheds as a child ages, usually between the ages of 4 and 8, after which your child will have mostly terminal strands of hair. In Nigeria, we have a common practice of shaving a child’s entire head of hair when they’re between the ages of 1 and 3. We do this with the aim of speeding up the process of vellus-shedding, so that when the hair grows back, the child is left with only terminal strands. Though this practice is more of an old wives’ tale than actual science, it’s rooted in an understanding that babies’ hair is more delicate than adult hair. 

With that in mind, no matter what else you do, make sure you show your child’s hair a lot of love. Keep it moisturised, hydrated and lubricated with light conditioners and oils, depending on their age…

Ages 0-3

Between the ages of 0 and 3, you’ll need to be very particular about what products you use on your child’s hair. At this age, you can’t use the same products on your child as you’d use on yourself. Keep it simple; we recommend simply using water and a light oil such as virgin olive oil.

Finally, it’s important to take good care of your child’s scalp. Younger scalps need more lubrication, so make sure you’re oiling and moisturising their scalp liberally. Kiddie hair can’t take as much manipulation as adult hair, due to their more sensitive scalps, so we recommend using looser protective styles on your kiddies, or avoiding styling their hair altogether if it’s short enough to get away with doing so.

Achieve this with the following OLORI products:

Age 2+: DamageBeGone Happy Hair Butter

Ages 4-8

This is the age bracket where your child’s vellus hair will begin to shed. At this point, their hair will become a lot more thick and robust, so it’ll start to require slightly more thorough moisturisation. You can begin to use leave-in conditioners on your child’s hair; we recommend following the LOC method to moisturise their hair (learn more about this in our Porosity guide). 

You can also begin to use non-baby shampoo on their hair, but be extra careful to keep this out of their eyes. 

Achieve this with the following OLORI products:

• Age 2+: DamageBeGone Happy Hair Butter
• Age 4+: DamageBeGone 3-in-1 Multi Conditioner
• Age 6+: DamageBeGone Conditioning Shampoo

Ages 9-13

At this point, you can begin to treat your child’s hair pretty much the same way you treat yours. We recommend still using a light touch with their hair; avoid putting their hair in high-manipulation styles and be careful when shampooing. See our Natural Hair guide for more information on how to take care of your child’s natural hair.