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"  In a 24-hour span, my facial skin-care routine averages nine to 12 products. The morning breakdown is cleanser, toner, serum, sunscreen, eye cream with SPF, and BB cream; the evening: cleanser, toner, mask, eye cream, night cream, lash serum. My hair? It gets hasty sudsings, perfunctory conditionings, and slapdash applications of dry shampoo. Then there&amp;#039;s the matter of my beloved hair tools, which reach scorchingly high settings of 450 degrees before I clamp, blow, or twirl them\u2014tufts of scented steam swirling in the air\u2014through my hair. Given this abuse, it&amp;#039;s no wonder that my hair is lackluster\u2014and it doesn&amp;#039;t help that it&amp;#039;s fine to the point of feathery and an ambiguous brown that my stylist calls &amp;quot;ashy mouse.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;No product can change your hair&amp;#039;s biology,&amp;quot; says Eric B\u00F4ne, senior vice president of global research and innovation at L&amp;#039;Or\u00E9al USA. &amp;quot;But you can make it healthier, which will improve the way it looks.&amp;quot; The key, he says, might be taking a less American\u2014and a decidedly higher maintenance\u2014approach to hair care: &amp;quot;U.S. women are interested in saving time. But for truly great hair, you must work on it as women in other cultures and countries do, and have a beauty hair routine.&amp;quot; With encouragement from B\u00F4ne, I resolve to take my hair\u2014if not my actual person, alas\u2014on an around-the-world tour, using the best global rituals, products, and techniques. In a recent worldwide survey of the hair health and habits of nearly 10,000 women, L&amp;#039;Or\u00E9al found that the country with the highest female hair satisfaction was Brazil. It was a surprise, considering the country&amp;#039;s less-than-optimal hair conditions\u2014extreme sun, high humidity, and frequent dips in salty ocean water, paired with a proclivity for heat styling and chemical treatments. &amp;quot;Sixty-four percent of them are happy with their hair, in spite of all that. Compare that with just 22 percent of American women, who damage their hair with just as many aggressors,&amp;quot; B\u00F4ne says. &amp;quot;Brazilian women shampoo and condition, of course, but they also use masks frequently. And 77 percent of women use cremes de pentear.&amp;quot; These &amp;quot;combing creams&amp;quot; (translated literally) are daily hydrating treatments that make wavy and curly hair (the predominant types in Brazil) more manageable. For my nonwavy, noncurly hair, B\u00F4ne suggests adding fortifying masks to my routine instead\u2014and, to add another country&amp;#039;s stamp to my hair passport, he says I should adopt Japanese-worthy discipline. &amp;quot;The women there replicate their skin-care routine\u2014cleansing, hydrating, masking, applying serums, massaging\u2014on their heads,&amp;quot; he says. The result? Healthier-looking hair (despite the highlighting and daily heat-styling to achieve the soft waves that are part of Tokyo&amp;#039;s current kawaii-cuties craze). The first product I try, a L&amp;#039;Or\u00E9al deep conditioner, is clearly skin care inspired, with ingredients such as ceramides (naturally occurring fatty acids) and arginine (an amino acid). After shampooing, I slather the cream from the middle of my hair to the ends, then I pin it all up in a bun and settle into a piping-hot bath (for the average Japanese woman, a long bath at the day&amp;#039;s end is preferred to our brisk morning showers). Thirty minutes later, I rinse\u2014and realize that I still have a long night ahead of me, between blow-drying and my aforementioned six-step skin-care routine. When I crawl into bed at nearly 1 a.m., my husband blearily asks, &amp;quot;What took you so long?&amp;quot; The next morning, my hair feels fuller, palpably softer, and shinier. Well, that was quick\u2014mission accomplished! Not so fast, says dermatologist Paul J. McAndrews, MD, a clinical professor at the University of Southern California School of Medicine. &amp;quot;Products can temporarily improve the look of your hair, yes. But they aren&amp;#039;t going to change the type of hair you have or permanently fix damage,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;Hair is composed of layers of dead protein. But the cells making up the outermost layer\u2014the cuticle\u2014lie like shingles on a roof. The smoother they are, the greater the perceived shine and softness of the hair.&amp;quot; What most products do is fill in gaps\u2014missing shingles\u2014or flatten the existing ones down. &amp;quot;They never undo or reverse damage. Take split-end products, for instance. Products that &amp;#039;repair&amp;#039; them are like glue used to put a broken vase back together. At the end of the day, it&amp;#039;s still broken,&amp;quot; McAndrews says. &amp;quot;Overall, products are a temporary fix, although some can help prevent damage. But your best bet is really to stop damaging hair, period.&amp;quot; I head to Redken&amp;#039;s Fifth Avenue headquarters in New York City for a damage-cessation master class from its education development manager, Sara Tomich. The cardinal (and most common) sin I&amp;#039;ve been committing? &amp;quot;You mistreat your hair when it&amp;#039;s wet,&amp;quot; Tomich says. &amp;quot;Hair is at its most vulnerable when damp\u2014much more prone to breakage. When you get out of the shower and throw hair into a bun, twist it with a towel into a turban shape, or even roughly blow-dry, you&amp;#039;re breaking hair.&amp;quot; She hands me a paddle brush so I can demonstrate my hair-brushing methodology. &amp;quot;Would you treat your face that roughly?&amp;quot; she asks, more than a tinge of horror in her voice. &amp;quot;When you rip your brush from root to tip, you&amp;#039;re causing serious mechanical damage. Those baby hairs you see, that halo of broken hair, is from improper brushing and wearing a tight ponytail.&amp;quot; The best technique, she says, is slow and methodical: &amp;quot;Brush small sections, starting at ends and then moving up,&amp;quot; with one hand on the brush and the hair lying flat in the palm of your other hand, the way Disney princesses always do. Finish by brushing the scalp with a natural-fiber brush to distribute oil.&amp;quot; Truth be told, I&amp;#039;ve always thought that scalp was one of the least appealing words in the English language (up there with sebum). But it&amp;#039;s one that I hear again and again as I speak to experts about hair health. &amp;quot;I really believe that it&amp;#039;s not what you do to your hair, but what you do to your scalp,&amp;quot; says Manhattan dermatologist Dennis Gross, MD. &amp;quot;The scalp, unlike hair, is living. And the same signs of aging\u2014dark spots, dryness due to decreased oil production, and inflammation\u2014affect it.&amp;quot; According to Gross, I should be treating my hair with the same care as my facial skin, certainly, and also using the same anti-aging ingredients. He cites a study from the University at Albany that found that topical application of specific forms of amino acids, alpha-lipoic acid, and fatty acids (all elements commonly used in facial skin care) inhibited a gene linked to inflammation of the hair follicle and alopecia. He then rattles off the extensive research published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, and Cosmetic Dermatology about peptides (another common anti-wrinkle-cream ingredient). &amp;quot;On facial skin, peptides are firming. But when applied to the scalp, they take care of free radicals, stimulate hair regrowth, and help the follicle. That means the hair that the follicle produces will be improved and have better vitality,&amp;quot; says Gross, who will launch a three-step anti-aging hair-care system (shampoo, conditioner, serum) infused with most of the aforementioned ingredients in July. July! While I wait, I test two other products: skin-care guru Peter Thomas Roth&amp;#039;s Hair To Die For serum (applied to the scalp), which gives my hair a thicker feel immediately, and K\u00E9rastase Initialiste. The latter, housed in a brushed-gold bottle that&amp;#039;s as luxurious as that of any skin-care product, is a green-tea- and ceramide-infused scalp treatment for daily use postshampoo. After a week, my hair looks shinier and swingier. And my shower drain seems to contain noticeably fewer hairs with each shampoo. Keen on completing my world tour of healthy hair habits, I add an oil (Phyto Phytopolleine Universal Scalp Elixir) to my scalp and another oil (Oribe Gold Lust Nourishing Hair Oil) on the ends and attempt to leave them in, mimicking the full-day hair-oil treatments favored by women in India. I last a full two hours before the slow dribbles down the back of my neck (and oily fingerprints all over my apartment) become unbearable. But the effects of a pre-shampoo oil immersion are not lost on me. My hair feels fuller and looks more vibrant\u2014similar to how well my skin reacts to face oils\u2014and, surprisingly, doesn&amp;#039;t look oily. &amp;quot;If you put essential oil on your scalp, it won&amp;#039;t make hair more oily\u2014the excess oils will be washed away with shampoo,&amp;quot; explains Phyto technician Sonya Makhoukh. The benefits of oil, though, don&amp;#039;t wash away: &amp;quot;Essential oils\u2014especially stimulating ones like sage, rosemary, or eucalyptus\u2014increase circulation and balance the pH levels of the scalp. Healthy scalp, happy hair.&amp;quot; Look for products with a base of coconut oil: A study from the research organization TRI/Princeton found that because coconut oil, unlike mineral oil, penetrates the hair shaft, it reduces &amp;quot;hygral fatigue,&amp;quot; damage that can occur when hair goes from dry to wet and back again. Three months later, my hair regimen has expanded by six products\u2014but seeing is believing. Thanks to my mash-up of Japanese, Brazilian, and Indian customs, my hair is longer, stronger, and ready to go on a real-life world tour. Liked this story? Get it first when you subscribe to ELLE magazine. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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