For a lot of us right now wearing our favourite sweats and only paying attention to our face and hair for long enough to keep them clean is as much as we can be bothered to do on a daily basis. For plenty of people, though, keeping to their usual daily routine as much as possible or making an effort to put themselves together is the way they best cope during all this weirdness. And then there are people like me, the middlegrounders, who love their sweats 80% of the time but feel sometimes, often suddenly, the urge to do one’s makeup and wear something nice Just Because.

But if you’re like me then you also maybe aren’t that great at making the effort to style your hair. That might be because your skill level means it takes a long time and a lot of grunts of frustration to even get vaguely close to what you were aiming for; maybe it’s because your natural hair means most styles don’t work like they do for those blessed with frizz-free straight locks, and styling always includes an extra pre-step of setting or straightening your hair; or maybe it’s because you just don’t enjoy it and it feels too much like work. All three of those apply to me, and that’s why normally when I’m feeling lazy I cheat with wigs and clip-in pieces as much as possible. I wanted to use my extra at home time to broaden my hair-styling horizons though, so I’ve come up with a handful of options that are quick and easy to do, even for those of us who suffer The Dreaded Three. Let’s do it!

What you’ll need: A hair tie, hair grips, hair spray, a smoothing brush, a comb, a hairbrush (whatever type you’d use for smoothing your hair out properly when tying it up.)
Optional: Hair flowers, head scarves, and/or turban knot headbands.

The Easy Natural Poodle Do

This one is for all of us curly girls. Whether your hair is just really wavy or tightly coiled, you can rock a natural poodle do in the easiest way by pulling all of your hair into a ponytail just in front of the crown of your head (that’s a little further forward than a high pony), then using hairgrips to pin it into place in the shape you most love. Hair flowers or headscarves can be added as desired to finish your look. You can also use your natural curls to achieve the half-poodle styles below.

You can use a hair net and silky hairscarf to wrap it up overnight to help preserve it for multiple days of wear.

 

The Easy Poodle Do

This is the same method as above, gathering the hair in ponytail just in front of the crown of your head and pinning in place as needed, but the result will be different if your curls are achieved as a result of a set, like mine are below. You can add hair flowers, a full coverage turban or head scarf as desired. Since I used hair flowers on my above natural hair Poodle I tied a hijab scarf into a full coverage turban for this one to show you how this hairstyle can be used to achieve different looks.

You can use a hair net and silky hairscarf to wrap it up overnight to help preserve it for multiple days of wear.

 

The Easy Half Poodle

Section the front of your hair as shown in this diagram then tie that top section into a ponytail that’s positioned just in front of the crown of your head. Gently gather the curls into the approximate shape you’d like your poodle do to take then simply begin adding pins where needed to hold that shape. Brush out the remainder of your loose hair with a smoothing brush and secure entire style with hair spray. Add hair flowers if desired.

You can use a hair net and silky hairscarf to wrap it up overnight to help preserve it for multiple days of wear.

 

The Easy Half Poodle + Pony

Create your half poodle do as instructed above, then brush your loose hair up into a high ponytail. You can add a fake ponytail as I have done if you want extra length and volume.

 

The Roll + Flow

If you have naturally straight hair or hair that forms a pretty wave, this style is the easiest for you. Section your hair (diagram of how here) and create a roll of your desired size/shape at the front of your hair, then simply tie a headscarf or slip on a headband behind the roll, leaving the rest of your hair loose. (I have naturally curly/frizzy hair which doesn’t look cute worn loose if it’s been slept on even once, so for this style I cheated and pinned a halfwig underneath my headband to show you what it will look like for those of you with straight, long locks.)

 

The Roll + Hide

If your natural hair texture won’t allow you to create the kind of look you’d prefer when trying the Roll + Flow above then this is the even easier alternative. Create a roll at the front of your hairline as above (sectioning diagram), then secure the rest of your hair into a bun on the crown of your head. Grab your favourite head scarf or turban and tie it fully, leaving only your front roll exposed.

 

The Pony + Roll

The easiest of all, and great for that last day or two before wash day. Create a roll at the front of your hair of your desired size/shape, then simply pull the rest of your hair back into a high ponytail. If, like me, your natural hair isn’t long enough to give you the long luscious ponytail you’d like you can use a faux ponytail to achieve full length and volume at the absolute minimum of effort.

 

The Fake Beehive

Great for your last style before washday. You can do this with or without a feature roll. If you’re going to do a roll then you need to section your hair first and create your roll at the front of your head. Then gather the rest of your hair into a ponytail and tie it into place behind your roll, just in front of the crown of your head. Gently backcomb all of the hair in your ponytail, working in sections. Once complete, carefully smooth the front facing side of your ponytail with a smoothing brush so that no backcombing is visible. Take the end of your ponytail in hand and lift it up and forward against the back of your head so that the backcombed body of your ponytail begins to form the wide, arched shape of a beehive. Pin the ends in place. In the first picture below you can see the shape of this bun without any decorations obscuring it. You can wear this as it’s own style if you love a massive bun, but to create the illusion that it’s a beehive you need to tie a hairscarf into place so that the back of your head is fully covered and the bow of the scarf sits between your front roll and your ‘beehive’, as shown in the second picture below.

 

I don’t have a set-up currently that would allow me to film or even easily take step-by-step pictures of hairstyles as I do them so hopefully my descriptions along with the pictures gives you enough information to achieve these styles yourself, as they’re so simple. When it comes to creating rolls I’m personally not a big fan of the way perfectly round, elevated victory rolls look on me, so I always prefer a slightly squashed looking roll when I create them, which is great news for those of you who feel the same or who simply struggle to create a perfect roll. Miss Victory Violet and Pinup Doll Ashley Marie have tons of video hair tutorials that show you how to create victory rolls properly, as well as other vintage styles, so if you’re a true vintage hair beginner I’d recommend checking them out to learn some of the basic techniques and terms.

If you want to know where I got any of the accessories shown in these pictures:
— The olive green headscarf is a jersey jihab scarf, of which I own several different colours. I get all mine from eBay (A/L) and tie them in various knots to achieve different looking turban shapes.
— I use a human hair claw ponytail regularly since my hair doesn’t have the length I want in ponytails. I got mine, once again, from eBay (A/L) because it’s hard to find the right colour match to my hair colour (99J), but if you have black, blonde or a brown hair colour you’ll be able to find a faux ponytail, real hair or fake, in tons of places.
— Turban hairbands – I make my own out of stretch jersey fabric, which I order from eBay. I don’t have a pattern, I just wing it and haven’t messed up beyond wearability yet, so making your own be a great project for you if you’re looking for something to do during quarantine. If you’d rather support small businesses there’s tons of turban and headband makers you can buy from, including SarahsDooWopDos, the first UK seller I ever saw producing turban headbands in the vintage style space.

Let me know if you adopt any of these styles, I’d love to hear from you! Hell, just leave a comment about anything at all, I’m sure we’re all happy to have an extra chat right now with so much spare time on our hands!

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[Disclaimer: Items marked with (A/L) are Affiliate Links.]