redhead in autumn

Review: Nicky Clarke professional flexi-stylers

Nicky Clarke flexi stylers

I’m a little bit obsessed with rollers at the moment.

You see, for almost two years now, I’ve been in the process of growing out the ill-advised fringe I decided to cut (by myself, natch) … and then decided to re-cut when it had almost grown out the first time. It’s been a long two years, let’s put it that way.

While my hair is in that horrible, in-between stage, it looks much better curly – or at least with a little bit of a wave in it – than it does straight, so I’m now at the stage where I curl it several times per week, and have tried a wide variety of products and techniques in my ongoing search for the perfect curl. When the people at Nicky Clarke offered to send me a set of their flexi-stylers to try, then, I jumped at the chance. I used to have a very similar set when I was a teenager, and used them fairly often, so I figured it might be fun to see how I felt about them having not used them for… let’s just say a while.

The curlers arrived, and were very much like the ones I remember. They come in a durable fabric container which plugs directly into the wall and heats up in about five minutes or so: there’s a handy light on the front which goes off once they’re ready to use, so you don’t need to guess. I find that they’re generally ready by the time I’ve finished blow-drying my hair, which is ideal.

bendy rollers

The case contains 18 stylers, which is more than enough to style even my fairly long hair: the instructions claim that they can be used to create various different looks, but I’ve had more or less the same kind of result every time I’ve used them: ringlet-style curls which brush out to form loose, beachy waves. (I should point out here that my hair doesn’t hold a curl AT ALL. When I use rollers, or any other kind of curling product, I do it knowing that my hair will be curly for maybe thirty minutes or so, before relaxing into loose waves. If your hair is better at holding a curl, you’ll be able to get much tighter, longer-lasting ringlets with these.) These are achieved by taking each roller, winding the hair around it (The more hair you use here, the looser the curl you’ll get. I use fairly small sections to get that “beachy wave” effect.) and then folding the styler in on itself to make it grip. As with any other type of curler, you then leave the hair to cool down before unwinding them (the longer you leave them, the better/longer-lasting the result) to let the curls loose.

hair in flexi stylers

Here’s the result on my hair:

hair after flexi stylers

In terms of what these are like to actually use, I find them a little more fiddly than regular heated rollers, because the rubbery surface of the stylers gives the hair a lot to hold on to, and I find that when I’m unwinding them I have to be more careful than usual not to snag my hair – you can’t simply undo them and let them drop out, as with ceramic rollers. They also take slightly longer to pack away again, because you have to straighten out each styler in order to get it to fit back into the case. For those reasons, these aren’t something I’d use if I was in a hurry, but with a bit of extra time on my hands (or my hair, rather), I think they’re great for creating this particular kind of style, and I like the fact that there are so many of them in the pack, so you don’t have to worry about running out of rollers before you run out of hair!

These are just £19.99 per set: buy them direct from Nicky Clarke by clicking here.

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books by Amber Eve
COMMENTS
  • SK

    REPLY

    Good to see you back!

    October 24, 2012
  • Clodyq

    REPLY

    Wow,welcome back.i must give those babies a try,might be just what my lanky locks need.:)

    October 25, 2012
  • Ooh I am intrigued. I’ve used traditional hot rollers and foam twisty things but they foam twisty things (that is the technical term, you know) needed to be used in damp hair and didn’t heat up. My hair isn’t nearly as long as yours but it’s very very thick and I’ve never had a roller set that I didn’t need to use in two stages (I should really suck it up and buy a second set).

    *goes to see if I can get them stateside*

    (I know this one is being revamped but I notice that Dollface has the option to be notified of replied via email. That’s a feature I really like. If I want to see if anyone replied on Shoeper of Forever Amber I have to remember to go back and check. I think the notifications help facilitate conversation in the comments. I don’t know if that’s consistent with your experience running the sites, though.)

    October 26, 2012
  • Luc

    REPLY

    Love that you are back!

    October 28, 2012
  • I’m glad you’re back! These rollers look really great, but I’m afraid in my super fine hair I would end up with insane ringlets and frizz everywhere.

    October 29, 2012
  • I’m so happy you’re back with HD. Don’t get me wrong I really like FA too, but I prefer here.

    November 1, 2012
  • Hi 😉 Could you say wchat type of skin you’ve got? Oily, combination or normal, dry?

    November 7, 2012
  • Elina

    REPLY

    Missed you! 🙂

    November 8, 2012
  • Hello there! I must say I love your hair curly I mean LOOOOOVE I have wild super curly hair but I just love yours! I am sort of angry at my hair at the momment because being a red head and almost winter my hair has not started going darker if anything its going more orange darn!

    November 10, 2012
  • lindsey

    REPLY

    I have major hair envy!!

    November 21, 2012
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