Why number 4s are better than number 1s or number 2s (John Frieda Frizz Ease Wind-Down Relaxing Creme)

Member Name: zoe_page_1

Product:	John Frieda Frizz Ease Wind-Down Relaxing Creme
Date:	16/09/02 (585 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: It works :-)

Disadvantages: You can't buy it over here :-(

As is the case with most of my better discoveries, I cam across this product quite by accident. I had about 3 hours to buy everything I would need for the next year and a half (working on the, quite correct, assumption, that Menorcan and German shops might not quite live up to the standards of Mancunian ones) and after checking my list, I saw I had all bar one of the items on it. The missing link? Frizz Ease. Quick dives into first Superdrug and then Boots left me empty handed. A recent re-branding, re-naming and re-packaging frenzy in the John Frieda offices meant I had a choice of a dozen or so products, but none the one I was used to. Oh my golly gosh, I was going to have to try a new product. Now the Frizz Ease range is quite extensive, and so although I was pushed for time, I was going to have to have a proper look. Each bottle or tube had a number on, the assumption being, I think, that you’re supposed to buy a 1, a 2, a 3, a 4 and a 5 to, ahem, “get the look” and achieve the results. I didn’t want the shampoos and conditioners though, nor really the serums, and so I took a wild guess at what might suit my hair and went for the creme, incidentally a number 4.

I took the bottle with me to Menorca, and first tried it there, in a grotty little bathroom of our staff apartment in Calan Forcat. Being one of the few girls who hadn’t brought a hair dryer with them, I decided to do as I always do, and ignore the directions on the label.

If you’re a good little girl or boy though, who likes to follow rules, then here’s what they say you should do.

Wash your hair (naturally using their shampoos and conditioners), and towel dry. Plop a small (very, very small in fact) blob of the crème on your fingers and work through your hair from root to tip. For straight here, dry with a hair dryer, and for frizz-free curls, leave to dry loose.

But, as I said, I’m not a good girl, and I don’
t follow instructions. The first time I wanted ringlets, so after using my own shampoo, I added some crème and went out in the sun to let my hair dry. Ringlets formed as ringlets do, but they were softer than normal which was kinda nice. The second time, I wanted straight hair, but without a hair dryer. So, I worked in the crème and then tied my hair back. 3 or 4 hours later in our lunch break, I let it down to find not only had it dried thoroughly, but it was completely and utterly straight, and frizz free and shiny to boot. Impressed? You betcha. It normally takes 2 hours in a hairdressers and the best part of 30 quid for me to get hair like that.

I’ve been using this ever since and the bottle still seems relatively full unless it’s got some clever packaging like Olay Total Effects where you think there’s loads left but actually it’s just the colour of the bottle. The curls don’t stay all that long in my hair (no more than a day and a half normally) so I wouldn’t agree with the claim that it “lasts until the next shampoo”. But, normally, I want straight hair anyway, and just want to dry it without tying it back so I end up with curls for a day. The next day when I get up, a quick brush is all it takes to straighten them out. Unlike with some products, this lets my hair go from super curly to super straight without having to wash it again – usually if I dry it curly it’s curls, curls, curls until I wash again.

I would give you the science behind it all, but I haven’t a clue how anything like this works – it’s a bit too far removed from the Bunsen burners and conical flasks of my school days. It works, but I don’t know how or why. The bottle promises that the creme will never be “sticky, stiff or flaky” and so far it hasn’t been (apart from one unfortunate incident at the start when the pump was a bit over excited and deposited 10 times too much on
my hand – not wanting to waste it, I combed it into my hair but soon wished I hadn’t when the solid lacquered hair of my gym comp days came back to haunt me). Let this be a warning – you really do only need a teeny weeny amount. You can always add more, but using too much to start with is just asking to have to wash your hair again.

The crème is a cloudy white colour which turns clear the minute it touches your hair, and has a nice if undefinable smell. The bottle is plainish (which although not all that stylish, is better than being garish, ish, ish).

At 3.95 for a standard 100ml bottle (Boots website price as of, erm, 5 mins ago), this will hardly break the bank, so if you want straighter hair, get hold of a bottle and give it ago. I have straight hair now, and you can too << cue cheesy grin and toss of the super straight hair >>

For more info head to www.johnfrieda.com

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