Kim Kardashian reportedly swears by the Olaplex hair treatment (it’s apparently how she goes to platinum and back again without wrecking her tresses), saying: ‘When your hair is really damaged, if you sleep in that, it really works. I notice a huge difference.’
What is Olaplex?
Olaplex was founded by Dean Christal, who teamed up with scientist Dr Craid Hawker and Dr Eric Pressly to cook up a new molecule that works from inside the hair strands to strengthen and repair damaged locks where the structure has broken down.
Nicola Clarke, Creative Colour Director at Color Wow and John Frieda Salons elaborates for us. ‘For colourists, the biggest game-changer in hair colour is Olaplex. It maximises the strength of hair by reconnecting broken disulphide sulphur bonds in the hair, which gives hair a thicker look and feels healthier and stronger,’ she explains.
‘The hair bonds break when hair is coloured and subject to regular heat and chemical treatments. It allows you to rebuild the strength, structure and integrity of hair and it is compatible with all hair types.’
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When should Olaplex hair treatment be used?
For best results, it’s important to use it during a colour treatment, rather than after it.
This is where some of the confusion around the hair treatment comes in – the Olaplex hair treatment is not a cure-all for dry or damaged hair. But it is a scientifically-developed treatment that works on hair condition from within, as opposed to a conditioner that improves only the superficial condition of damaged tresses.
Does Olaplex hair treatment really work?
With such rave reviews and celebrity endorsements, does Olaplex mean we don’t need to worry about over bleaching and styling our hair any more? Not exactly. We asked trichologist Sally-Ann Tarver for her thoughts on the process.
But she does warn that it’s not a miracle fix for damaged hair: ‘My professional experience of it is that I have seen cases of severe hair damage, in which the hairdresser has attempted multiple bleaching procedures in the opinion that using Olaplex can allow then to rewrite the rules of chemical processing. Unfortunately for their clients, using Olaplex does not mean hair can be bleached multiple times without disintegrating.’
