Oh my goodness! I just has to post this because I just transformed my daughters frizzy doll’s hair into silky awesomeness! I can’t believe it worked so I decided to share the joy! This will work on Barbie, American Girl and other dolls that have the silky plasticky hair. Let me start by saying that this was not how I planned to spend my Saturday. But daughter Maizy was so upset at the state of her dolls hair that I thought I at least had to try. After I tamed that beast into submission (the doll not the daughter) I decided to try the not as crazy mane of Lila’s doll. Let’s start with that method as it was easier and there is no point to go through all of the steps I needed for Maizy’s doll if the hair is not that bad. Here you can see lila’s doll, one side of the hair is fixed, the other is not…I think you can tell which is which….
This was an easy fix. I simply took a pump of frizz serum and worked it through the dry hair. Then I combed out a section and pulled the section through my hot curling iron. You can use a hair straighter for this too but I don’t have one. Repeat until you have done all of the hair. You can snip any ragged ends if you need to. Easy peasy, about 15 minutes total time.
Maizy’s doll was a different story, have a gander ant the “before” picture:
Yikes! Sorry about the poor photo, I had one of the girls snap a pic before we started so we could see before and after (I didn’t think it would work!) and I didn’t plan to blog it but it was such an amazing transformation that I had to share! Here are the steps I took to turn this dolls hair from scary to silky!
- Brush hair as best you can, don’t worry if you can’t get a comb through it.
- Wash hair with mild shampoo, rinse well.
- Condition with about 1/4 cup of conditioner.
- Comb through the hair with the conditioner in then rinse in hot water.
- Squeeze out as much water as you can by hand then squeeze with a towel to remove more water.
- I let the hair air dry a bit but I got impatient, I’d say it was 90% dry when I added 2 pumps of frizz serum to the hair.
- Plug in a hair straightener or larger curling iron and let it heat up.
- Working on the left side first comb through a small section of hair then pull the hair through the curling/straightening iron and comb again. You might need to repeat a couple of times on each section. Trim off any straggly ends. Place the finished hair to the left. Note, I held the doll with my legs so my hands were free to manage the brush and curling iron. Repeat with all of the hair.
I found it easiest to put the hair in a ponytail after I washed it but that is up to you. In the photo you can see the hair I did not straighten yet on the right and the silky straightened hair on the left. The hair was still a bit damp when I worked. I think you can do this on dry or damp hair as my other daughters doll’s hair was dry when I straightened it. Here is the finished doll and happy daughter:
Well, this was not so much a crafty post but I’m sure many of you mom’s out there will find it useful. If you have any questions just leave a comment. Til next time happy crafting!
The Frugal Crafter Blog 
WOW! It is funny b/c my real hair is just about as bad as Maizy’s doll hair! (before fixing) I would have thought that my hair straighter which is a professional one that is SUPER HOT would melt the doll hair. I have thrown away a ton of doll through the years both for me and for my 3 daughters! Thanks for sharing.
Valerie
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Good job…your a great mom!
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brilliant. my daughter is too old for dolls now ,but has a couple of favourites and their hair is a mess. i will definetly try this.
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I thought the plastic hair would melt!
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Good job!!! Happy daughters!!!!
Paper Hugs,
Jan
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Well, I am way past the age of having daughters with dolls and my granddaughters are beyond that stage too, but I sure got a kick out of today’s post :). Thanks for the smiles……..and, by the way, you are a great MOM!
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Thank you so much for sharing this. I may be a 44 year old Royal Marine Commando, but on Boxing Day faced with a tearful youngest daughter and an over hair brushed new favourite doll, I turned to the web, and morphed into overnight hairdresser. Success, though (with a near shaven head myself) I’ve had to learn some rapid lessons about how fast straighteners get very hot! Thanks again, yours Mac
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But wouldn’t the heat from the Hair straightener melt the hair?
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use on damp doll hair. I’m sure mine is not super hot either, maybe try the low setting first just in case. It worked like a charm for me;)
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I tried this on my our generation ayla doll with hair the same as maizy’s,using a remington straighter and I had little to no result,where as my other our generation doll,april,has beautiful hair,no matter how much brushed .I really want her hair to fixed.any advice?(the straightener was on the lowest temperature)
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I did this and it burned the hair off 😡😢
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Maybe try it on a lower temperature
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I used damp hair, a towel over the hair in sections and an iron set on a medium setting, with steam, then let it cool just a bit and brush or comb through. I haven’t gotten all the frizz out, but a lot. I’ll keep trying, but so far my granddaughter is so happy her OG doll looks so pretty now. I wish I’d have gotten a before picture! I also did a hot water from the sink method, in small sections, first. Hold it under for a minute or so, then comb/brush through. The combination really made a difference. I did start with shampooing and conditioning, then a detangling leave in spray. Fun project with great results!
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I have Parker from our genaration and I am wondering if I can cut the hair so it looks better, Parker is from hair to there doll and her hair is horblily wild
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My dad even tried to comb the hair but it just broke the comb/ it was a hairbrush, any suggestions for thick long doll hair?
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did you wash it first? I would try washing it, rinsing it really well and applying a lot of conditioner to the damp hair.. You can use the cheap stuff from the dollar store. Don’t rinse the conditioner out. Take a small bit of hair and comb it and move it to one side, then another small section until you have combed it all out. Then you can use a hair strainer on low or a curling iron to pull the doll hair smooth and strait. Make sure you use the iron on damp hair so you don’t melt it! then you can trim the frizzy bits off the ends. The key is to keep it combed out. Put her hair in a ponytail or braid when you are done playing and that will keep it good. Good luck!
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will have to remember this
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If you use a detangling (or a wig) brush, and start from the bottom, in sections, it works a lot better
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Oh my gosh! I just want to thank you because I did this with one of my old american girl dolls today and he looks amazing now!!! I’m about to go fix up some more!!!
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How long will it last? We just got a Chad Valley Red haired doll from Argos, the 63cm one. Within a month her hair is an absolute mess. Have done the conditioning and combing with small result, perhaps serum and the hot iron tomorrow.
And on researching I discovered how to prevent this.. use a metal wig comb! Thats it! American girl make one specially (amazed that $100 doll’s have frizzable hair)
After discovering this i’ve used a cats brush with metal prongs.. really calmed down the frizz, but just not quite enough. It still kind of looks like your second dolls bad side! lol
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quite a while and we never let the dolls hair get to that point again. If you brush the hair and put it in a braid or ponytail before you toss it in the toybox (or when not in use) it will stay nice. The girls occasionally with spray the dolls hair with detangler and brush it if it gets frizzy and maybe once a year use the strait iron on low (make sure hair is damp) to calm it.
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I came on this site because we have a Chad Valley doll – Evie, with fuzzy hair. I was just going to give it a haircut, but may well try this now
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your amazing i love the bride of Frankenstein costume
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Do you think on a doll like Maizy’s the frizz serum is entirely nesscary for the process to work right? I have an our generation doll thats about five years old that is about as bad as those two combined, (However five years ago the quality of our generation doll was no where to be found) that I fixing up before possibly putting into storage
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I think any conditioner will work, or even a few drops of baby oil.
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Thanks
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When my granddaughter asked me to mail her doll to American Girl to have its hair fixed, I said they wouldn’t “fix” it, just pop her head off and stick another one on.
I think after therapy, Little Susie may go on to lead a normal life…and maybe go to a beauty parlor someday. (What was I thinking??)
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Just to be clear my daughter had Holly first, then for DoB she got an America Girl Doll. She loved Holly until her hair got ruined. She also stopped playing with her because the American Girl doll’s hair was nice and easy for her to comb. She requested another American Girl doll that looked like Holly. This is how you saved me from buy another very expensive doll. She loves Holly again and promised to care for her hair.
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Having just taken delivery of a secondhand Josefina with frizzy hair I have been reading everything I could, so this afternoon have bought a Remington hair straightener with temperature settings, so tomorrow’s the big day – wash all that hair then see what I can do to make it lovely as it should be – she’s such a beautiful doll that I am really keen to see her with shiny black hair.
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use it on the lowest setting to start with:)
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Sorry I didn’t follow up on my June posting. Yes, it worked. I used some argon oil (very sparingly) and it has made the world of difference.
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thanks for letting me know, I use that on my own hair LOL! It does help with frizz!
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my daughter has the singing Elsa dolly and her hair is awful now just all fuzzy and wont go back into the plait that it should due to being so frizzy how can i fix this please???
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For my daughters Elsa doll I used warm water, hair conditioner, a comb and brush. I wet the hair and brushed it out, then combed the conditioner through the hair then re-plaited her hair while it was still damp. ***Be sure to wrap the dolls buttons and speaker with cling wrap so you don’t ruin the singing feature***
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Wow my dolls hair was not as bad as yours but it really worked my dolls hair looks so much better. Thank you
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It worked! i didn’t have a straightener so i used my iron! American girl camp here we come!!!!!
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I tried this on one of my dolls and it worked perfectly. Her hair is better than when I first got her. I’ve been looking for a solution for these problems which keep occurring in all my dolls’ hair. Thank you so much for sharing this with us.
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Well that was interesting because I wanted to do this for many years. And didn’t know how to go about it. But I have a Crissy doll and a velvet doll from when I was a Youngster and I am going to do this this evening to see if it works thanks for the information and happy crafting.
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My doll lost a lot of hair in this process. 😦 But it solved the frizz problem! Olivia may be wearing hats from now on, though.
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I only have Ghd straighteners with no adjustable setting. Will they be too hot to use and melt the doll’s hair. I have a leave in spray conditioner, do you think this would work?
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