Lace Front wigs (aka wig-building 101)

Ahhhh, lace wigs. So classy, so realistic, so.....expensive. That's not even getting into the full-lace wices, nice quality lace-front wigs can start around $70-80 for even basic hairstyles and go up from there, well over $100 for a long wig of good quality. You can sometimes find really good deals if you hunt (I've been able to find lace-fronts as low as $30 but it was a matter of "last in stock" or a discontinued item, etc, so it was more of a purchase of opportunity than being a specific wig I was looking for), and such occasions aren't really reliable or predictable. While I have started to see a handful of lace-front wigs targeted at cosplayers, for instance Arda Wigs has a few I discovered recently, they are still on the higher end, $60 or so when I saw them at a con recently.

However, out of curiosity I looked into what it takes to make a lace wig. Plus, you never seem to find lace wigs in unnatural colors or offbeat styles, and well...I seem to always end up working on those.

I had already seen some of the steps in a theatrical costuming book (Stage Makeup by Richard Corson, pick up a copy if you see it and you have interest in facial prosthetics, hair, and makeup, it's quite informative and useful), but wanted to see if I could find more info. Well, sure enough I did, but there's a lot of information out there and a lot of it might give you stuff like steps A and D, but assume you'll automatically know B and C since most of the people who are doing this have been doing it professionally for years. Either that, or people purposely leave out info, not really sure. I'll assume the best though.


So first off, materials. These are the things you should really have, a lot of which I hadn't heard of before reading the book and looking into it, but they are either necessary, or make life a LOT easier. I'll try to give options for doing it yourself as well, since some of these "specialty" items are quite expensive.

While most sources suggest you have a wig block, and/or make a tape "cast" of your head, that mostly pertains to fully custom wig creation. For just adding a lace front to a wig, you should be ok with a normal styrofoam wig head. However, a wig clamp or other securing device will be necessary.

T-pins. These will be used to pin down the lace when you're working on it.

Ventilating needle. Before I ordered one, and when I hadn't found any inexpensively, I got a feel for doing it with a small crochet needle, a #12 (1.0mm or smaller will work, as small as you can get it is ideal, which seems to be #14, 0.75mm). If you do this, simply bend the end of the needle (you can use your fingers, they're pretty easy to bend), like this [image]. However, you may need to take an emery board or fine sandpaper to smooth out where you bent it, there could be a very snaggy spot where the chrome plating cracks and flakes on most needles at that spot.

However, if you want to just skip this and go straight for the real deal, International Wig has the 1/2 strand and 3/4 strand needles for $6 each, which is a good price. However, I found out when I got mine that the needle is sold alone, you must put it in a handle of your choosing or buy the separate "ventilating needle holder" which is significantly more expensive than the needle alone about $30). I decided to mount mine into a spare paintbrush handle.

Hair lace. While there is in fact specialized lace in various sizes and visibilities, it is all quite expensive. IT can be found at both International Wig and Amphigory as either "Hair Lace" or "Wig Foundation", (specifically for a "hand tied wig"). While the quality is worth it I am sure, especially considering it is usually intended for wigs worn long-term, for a costume I will only wear and handful of times for a few hours, I am willing to sacrifice some durability and comfort if needed. That being said, you can buy rolls of fine-grain tulle in the wedding section of many craft stores, (or even by the yard in fabric stores if not), the pre rolled stuff comes in several colors that are decent semi-near matches for basic skin tones, ivory, off-white, and two shades of brown. Said tulle will only cost you around $3-4 for a roll, or usually $2-3 per yard. The smaller the holes, the less visible and the more hair you can get per square inch, but you don't want to go too small as you won't be able to easily fit the needle, the wedding stuff is a perfect size for the needle I use. For simplicity I will just refer to any of it as "lace" for the rest of this.



Loose hair. Obviously, you need hair of some sort,  the straighter the better, loose or wefted, doesn't matter, whatever you find that is the best match. Wefted hair will need to be cut off of the tracks, however.

Drawing Card. This will save your sanity when dealing with the loose hair. While you can buy one, this is one of the higher-priced items due to specialty, as very few places carry them. Thanks to the magic of the internet, I found out how to make your own and will share that here. (forthcoming)

Hackle Board. Same situation as the drawing card, but this is used mainly to blend the loose hair if you have several shades to mix, it does the job quite well. It also works a bit as an extremely forceful comb to pull out any weak or damaged hairs from the loose hair. Also have information on how to make one of those. (forthcoming)


All right, well, we have all that out of the way....ready?

For most of the pictures, I'm using brown lace and green hair for extra visibility. It's hard to do a lot of this one handed so in some cases you will just have to get the general idea from the picture.

First, you need a wig. I recommend one of the kind that has a slightly "raised up" hairline already as it will be a bit easier to manage (Ie the kind where the hairline has that little "kink" right at the base where the hair lifts up slightly and bends back on itself as opposed to coming straight out and down over the edge). The ones where the hair is down tend to be a bit thicker and harder to sew on, as well as having the wefts positioned oddly (such as coming from underneath the edge and overlapping over to the top). If it's got a skin top, try not to poke holes all the way through it and instead just go through the fabric backing underneath when you sew the lace down.

Ok, so take a piece of the lace, you want a good amount, the rolled kind is good because you can just cut off a length of it and cut it down when you need to. Cut off a piece that can run from ear tab to ear tab across the top of the wig, letting it extend out at least 3-4 inches from the edge of the wig. Using a needle and thread, sew the lace to the underside of the wig just inside the edge, with about an inch underlapped beneath the wig. Use medium-sized stitches, firm, but without pulling the thread too tightly.

Put the wig on your head and see how it fits and if the lace is doing anything odd like puckering or tearing. Adjust as needed.

Now, put the wig onto a wig head. Using T-pins, pin at each corner as well as every few inches along the forehead at the front edge. Pin at the edge of the lace rather than directly through it to avoid piercing/tearing the lace.

Now, you're ready to go! Here's where it gets a little tricky, and what took me a little while to figure out how to get right.

First, press your loose hair into the drawing card if you have one, or else lay it out loose in the package and hope for the best. Either way, you want the ends of the hair facing you within easy arm's reach.

Holding the needle in one hand, pull out 1-3 strands with your other hand. (For hair rooted very close to the wig, you can use 2-3 at a time, however this will cause a more visible "dot" where the hair is knotted, so as you get further from the wig you will want to only use one at a time so that it looks natural.)



Double the hair over so that you now have a loop, holding it a few inches below the loop.



Taking the needle, hook it down into the lace and up through an adjacent hole, with the needle facing upwards.


Hook the loop with the tip of the needle, pulling it towards the lace. As you reach the hole in the lace, rotate the needle downwards.


If done correctly, the loop will come through with relative ease to the other side. It will take some trial and error to get right, but once you get the hang it is fairly easy (but tedious). If it feels at all "snaggy" back up and try again, don't force it through as you may tear the lace and while you might be able to get away with one or two single torn holes, more and you will need to start all over from the beginning as it will greatly weaken the lace and cause patchy spots on top of it.


Now, push the hook back through the loop after pulling a few inches of it through, and catch the other side of the hair with the hook. Rotate the hook as you pull so that you loop the hair around the tip, maintaining a light grip on the hair with your other hand as you do so. If all is well, you will then be able to pull the hair back through the loop, grab the ends, and pull them tight so that the loop closes and makes a small knot right at the lace.


Now, repeat as needed. This is the tedious part and could easily take many many hours (10+ easily, depending).

Once you have finished, put the wig on your head and determine where it sits and where you want to cut the lace, you want to cut as close as possible to the hairline without cutting the hair. Use sharp scissors, make many small cuts to cut down the risk of cutting unevenly or jaggedly. The side areas, leave about 1/4" of extra lace if possible.

Once this is done, if you want to put the latex on the underside of the wig, this will help glue down the loose lace as well as make it grip your head slightly better, simply take a small amount on the top of your finger and lightly rub it into the first few inch or so of lace under the wig, preferably around where you sewed it. Once this has dried you can then cut away the excess lace under the wig past that, if desired.


Now, you simply need to glue the wig down when you're ready to wear it. There's plenty of info around on how to wear lace wigs so I'll just lightly touch on the subject.

Spirit gum can be used for a short term purpose, or a special lace front adhesive (there are types of glue as well as tape) can be used if the wig will be worn for extended time or under lots of movement. Either has their own type of removal solution which is definitely recommended. Simply put the wig on your head, roll the edge of the lace up and back, and spread a small amount of glue just ahead of your natural hairline following any directions needed (spirit gum for instance, requires a slight touching to become tacky, some glues require heat or time to set), and then press the lace down onto the tacky glue and hold gently in place until bonded. That's that! There are some products out there to protect your skin and hair from the adhesive if needed.

Kittan Bachika (Tengen Toppa Gurren-Lagann)

Ok, finally time for an actual making-of costume (or in this case wig) post, instead of just me going on and on about how I do things. That was the point of this blog, you know? I do enjoy to talk, so I hope I'm at least being helpful and not annoying.

Anyway, Kittan. Had a friend ask me to cosplay with her about 2 weeks before Nekocon, decided to do the first version of Kittan since I knew I could throw it together relatively easily in little time. Plus, I've always wanted to try making his hair as a wig.

So first off, I've discovered something useful when trying to make short boy wigs, especially spiky or "up" ones, within reason, using natural-style wigs instead of costume wigs meant for the purpose.

Curly wigs. No really. First, because a lot of the wigs that are meant for cosmetic purposes tend to be made a bit better, and I can manage to find them cheaply at a lot of local wig stores because they're so common. The wig I started off with I got for around $5 because they were getting rid of a lot of old stock (this particular one is a Paula Young "Heather" which seems to be a discontinued style), but I've gotten them in the $8-10 range quite often. The reason for the curly wigs is that they work better going shorter and up because of how they are made; the wefts tend to be a bit denser and closer together than most short and mid-length wigs, and they have a bit of body at the roots that assists in going up and into spikes. (The easiest way to tell if they will be good for this or not, is if you can see the wig in person, you can slightly separate the hair with your fingers and see how close together the wefts are at the roots, there are some out there that are really sparse that just make up for it with extreme poof.) Of course, you have to straighten them first. I discovered this phenomenon when I bought a light blue afro wig out of desperation in the hopes I could straighten it [link] and it totally worked. It's relatively easy, gently comb the wig out, then patiently steam it straight. It doesn't take too long, but you definitely can't rush it. It also helps to clip up the wig in sections and straighten it in parts, especially if it's an extremely poofy wig, and it also helps if you're going to spike it up to not straighten it all the way to the roots at the top of thew wig, leave the last 1/2" or so slightly wavy.


Anyway, so I started with this:




Brushed it out, sectioned out the part that would be Kittan's glorious rooster-hair (basically the whole crown) and began steaming the rest down:


I then carefully cut the wig with a razor and scissors, checking periodically to make sure I wasn't making it too thin, a good rule of thumb is that you want the hair you are cutting to be a few inches past the top of the next row below it and then carefully work shorter from that in tiny amounts testing it on your head periodically. Unfortunately, no pictures of this as I managed to misplace my camera and didn't have time to wait to continue working on it once I found the camera.

Then, time to color. Decided to make wig dye with an even amount of black ink and sepia ink to give it a bit of warmth, ended up having to go a bit darker than I intended as I wanted a good even color. Used my airbrush since I wanted the control of being able to get into precise areas (like at the base of the hair) as needed. Decided I didn't like the ash blonde for the remaining part as Kittan's hair is very bright, mixed up a batch of wig dye with a bit of golden yellow and canary yellow and sprayed just a bit on, just enough to give it a yellowy tint. Ended up looking like this:





Let it sit overnight, and then rinsed the wig in cold water, fortunately not much dye came off as it seems like when using the airbrush you don't have much excess dye. Since the wig felt a bit rough, (dying with ink will often make the fiber feel just a little bit squeaky, especially when you go from light to dark, I assume because of ink build-up), I combed and rinsed it in conditioner it which brought it back to feeling normal.

Finally, chopped into the crest of hair a bit with a razor and scissors to make it a bit more choppy and not just look like a plume of bed-head, and then added some hairspray and hair glue.



Now, if only I had a single picture of me in the costume, heh. There were a few things I would fix on the costume itself next time around, but overall it turned out ok.

Party wigs (and such things)

The other day I was in Wal-Mart and randomly passed through the clearance Halloween section (well, ok...it wasn't random, I was looking for cheap candy) and saw their selection of cheap costume wigs. This made me a bit nostalgic, because thinking about it... when I first started making costumes, there was a very minimal selection of wigs to choose from. You had the ultra-low-quality halloween wigs that would show up in stores around halloween, you had the slightly less cheap but still pretty horrible "party wig" stuff that you could find in, well, party stores, as well as the halloween costume stores that pop up during the season, and in places like Spencers that also sell (sold? I haven't been in one in years, so I'm not sure) costumes and accessories, and then you had wigs that you could find for cosmetic reasons in dedicated stores, usually fairly pricey and nothing crazy in color or style. Sure, there was that one website here or there, or a store somewhere that might have some more eccentric wigs, but for the most part you'd be lucky to see more than a handful of "unnatural" colors or styles at many of those places.

Anyway, we all made do with some pretty terrible wigs, if wigs at all, because we had no choice in the matter. I can even remember "stocking up" on halloween wigs when they showed up because I didn't know if or when I might need a certain color and not be able to find it anywhere when I needed it because once I went to the 2 or 3 places I knew of, that was it. Things have come a long way and I know I am pretty spoiled now by being able to go to multiple sites online including eBay of all places with a color and style in mind and have multiple choices to look through, even when it's something a bit off-beat, and that's not even accounting for all of the sellers that sell pre-styled mass-produced "character" wigs, or the cosplayer-oriented sites and sellers.

Well, I've rambled enough. Point is, the wigs were dirt-cheap due to said clearance and just out of some sort of curiosity and misplaced nostalgia I bought one for $2 just to see if they were just as bad as I remembered. Then I wanted to see if there was any way to actually work around the known flaws of the products. For no real reason other than just messing around because I was bored. That's kind of how I am.

So I got this wig:


First off, I knew that it wouldn't look anything like the package, they never do.

In fact, it looked like this:


Yeeeeeeeaaaaaaah some things never change.

Cheap party wigs always have that odd sort of "sparkle" to the fiber, I guess it must be the material they use for the fiber as I only ever see it on these kind of wigs. However, the fiber was a lot softer than I remembered, so at least they've done something about that. You'll never know what they're made of because you're lucky if the tag even says "100% synthetic fiber", most of the time it's just a barcode and tells you that it was made somewhere in asia.

So first off, they almost always have that flip and crease on the side from being folded over and crammed into a tiny bag for so long. All that takes is usually a gentle brushing (don't want to be too vigorous, I've had some of them have the wefts start pulling out in huge chunks, right out of the bag) and then a rinse in warm water, maybe with some conditioner if you want, I know I used some. Then I touched up a few trouble spots with steam because there were a few really set-in flippy bits that wouldn't stay down.
Used some scissors to even out the bangs since they were amazingly jagged yet blunt at the same time.



Ok, that looks more like the package image.

Of course, now, what do I do with a cheap bright orange bob wig? After casting around in my head for a character that had orange hair that I could possibly style this into, the only one I could think of was Tasuki from Fushigi Yuugi. Yeah, it's way too bright, but whatever. Let's do this.

So first off, there's usually two major flaws with this kind of wig that affects styling it in any way other than how it came packaged.

A) The wefts on the back of the head are extremely thin and very far apart
B) There is extra hair radiating from the the top of the crown to help cover this, but only slightly.

Oddly, despite the fact that this wig was using a cheaper kind of fiber, it was very heat resistant, much more so than usual wigs. Considering that the pricier wigs often have heat-resistance as a feature, I found this amusing.

So first, I pinned up the hair in a few sections trying to figure out just how bad it was. It was pretty bad:



On top of that, the quality was exceptionally bad, there were wefts not even sewn down, parts where they extended past and just hung off the wig like a tail, and parts where they didn't even attempt to go in a straight line. Still, got a general idea of what could be done with it. (Not much).

Using a razor comb and thinning scissors, tried to chop it up just a bit without going too deep or thin. Basically just went over it overall since the whole thing was blunt and uneven in a really unappealing way. Pulled a little bit of the top hair forward to add to the bangs and tried to make them more choppy and less like 80's girl bangs. Also cut off the bizarre dangling weft tails.

Considered the wefts a bit, and thinking about it, a lot of costume wigs (like the New Look New Punk for instance) also have widely spaced wefts and they add volume at the roots to cover for it. Figured I could give it a shot, normally I hate when wigs come like that because it's a pain to deal with, but in this case, what is there to lose. Accomplished this by teasing the hair with backcombing; basically you grab a section of the hair and pull it out firmly from the wig, and then take a fine-toothed comb and comb downwards along the last few inches of the hair towards the "roots", in a few quick firm strokes. Normally you wouldn't want to do this with a good wig (or even your own hair, hello 1980s) because it weakens the strand and causes breakage as well as being a pain to get out later, but in this case, what the heck.
Well, it worked, it added just enough volume at the roots to move the hair around a bit without showing gaping spaces and wig netting, even on my head. (Important: always test your styling periodically on your own head instead of a wig head, especially with cheaper wigs, as there is almost always some "give" to the mesh cap that you won't see on the smaller wig head that once you place it on your head, will invariably spread apart and give you unexpected results, if you're doing something major like going from short to long, or down to up/out. In extremely low-quality wigs like this, the cap is just like a loose mesh bag with a fold you can actually grab in your hand at the base of the skull, which will be pulled taut on your head and needs to be accounted for.) Gave a little extra poof and some hairspray at the crown since Tasuki has that weird sort of poofbump to his hair.
Unfortunately, couldn't take too much of the length off anywhere because I needed it to hide another spot when I repositioned it (the temples/sides of the wig were especially bad for this, they always are)

Finally, there was a dense roll of curls at the nape of the neck, steamed those down a bit in hopes of getting the Tasukimullet. Didn't work too well as the fiber didn't completely unroll even when I blasted it, and even if it was perfectly straight it wouldn't be quite long enough. Thought "well, I could get some loose hair in this obnoxious orange since I know I've seen it at the wig store for $2 and weft it in" and then mentally berated myself for trying to add extra work and money to a pointless throw-away wig adventure.



So anyway, when it was all said and done I pinned it into place and used a bit of hairspray and a tiny bit of hair glue and there you go.







Is it an awesome (or even 100% accurate) Tasuki wig? Hell no.
Is it finding semi-usefulness in even something cheap? Yes.
Is it trying to dress up a pig in fancy clothing? Maybe. Depends on your definition. I certainly wouldn't use this with an OMG-I-spent-50-hours-making-this costume.

Either way, it just goes to show that while you won't have fantastic results, you can still do something with even the cheap wigs, that I suppose is better than nothing, when you can't find or afford something better.

Wig Straightening

I've sort of touched on this here and there in reference, but not really described in detail, so here we go.

There are several methods to straightening a wig. First, there's the occasional wig you can use heated styling tools on (mostly the ones sold as heat-resistant, of course) but most wigs will simply fry and crimp up the minute you touch a flat iron or curling iron to them. I know this from experience, despite people telling me otherwise. Maybe I just have bad luck. Second, if you're adventurous you can use a hairdryer and brush. However, there is a very close margin on how hot you can get a wig with a hairdryer before it frizzes into oblivion, and it's hard to determine at times. This can be somewhat avoided by keeping a spray bottle of water near you and periodically spraying the wig to keep it damp, but sometimes it seems to happen despite best efforts. Obviously heat-resistant wigs are less prone to this.

Finally, there's the two methods I have used: hot water and steam. I personally prefer steam because it is easier to control and less messy, so I will mostly focus on that. For the hot water method, just get a pot of water to a boil and either dunk the wig in it, or pour the water over it. Dunking works best for things like extensions you can grab in your hand, pouring works best for entire wigs (on a wig head). Either way, you will then have a hot, drippy mess you need to put somewhere, as well as a place to pour boiling water. Be careful pouring boiling water into bathroom fixtures as they can break, definitely don't ever do it over a toilet as it could crack the porcelain. Tubs are usually ok. Let the wig drip dry in a place where it can hang freely and you should be good to go, but may need to repeat if it didn't straighten completely.

Steaming, on the other hand, is a process that takes a little bit longer but has more...interactive, I suppose, results. First though, you need a steamer. You can get a small travel-size one for a reasonable price with the downside that with very long wigs or extensively curly wigs you will most likely need to stop, refill, and let it boil once again, periodically; or you can invest a larger garment steamer that will hold much more with the added benefit of having other purposes such steaming fabric, these tend to be in the $30-150 range depending on how big and/or fancy you want to be. I have a Shark EuroPro that I think cost $40 or so. The other key item is a detangling comb, as they run freely through the wig without too much grab and pull, a brush or fine-toothed comb could snag and break the heated (and therefore more fragile) fibers. Comb the wig out beforehand to get out any tangles and to break up the curls a bit on a curly wig.

In this example, I used a sky blue afro wig. I was a bit desperate for a wig in this color and after getting several that weren't quite the right shade (was trying to match existing extensions) I happened to find this one in a store. Right color, but toooooooootally wrong style. Having steamed wigs straight before I figured I'd give it a shot, though. 

First, section off the hair, at the very least section off the crown of the wig from the rest below, but with really curly wigs it helps to section it again at the middle.

Then, slowly work your way around the wig, running the steamer head down the hair from the root to the tip, following with a gentle pass of the comb. If the wig is being particularly problematic, you can try running the comb and steamer down the hair at the same time, or applying gentle pressure by holding the tips of the hair taut so that the hair is pulled straight as you steam it., but don't tug too hard or roughly drag a comb through it as it can actually cause crimping in the fiber from stretching it while it is hot. If you've pinned parts of the wig you are steaming, pull the pins out as you steam the areas they are in as they will leave creases marks in the wig otherwise. I start a few inches away from the wig with the steamer and gradually get closer, with most wigs I have been able to actually rest the steamer head against the hair and pull downwards by the end, flattening it very quickly, but I'm always careful because it is still possible to fry some wigs with steam...just a lot harder than with heated tools.

That's basically it. Once you're all done allow the wig to cool and dry before you do anything else to it as when the fiber is still warm it is flexible and will take new shapes. If there are any spot areas, a stray wave or crease you can always spot steam that once spot.

In the case of extremely curly wigs, like this afro wig, I needed to go in and trim the very ends of the hair in a few places as the curls left rough split-end-like tangles in spots.

Here are some other before-and-afters:

Also cut bangs into this for a friend's Athena Asamiya (Psycho Soldier vers.) wig. That then got lost in the mail before she got it. Ah, well. Color is Cyclamen from Amphigory (don't remember which wig it was), which is an uncommon and unusual color but pretty much perfect for that character.

Was going to use this for an Oshino Meme (Bakemonogatari) costume until I realized the hair wasn't quite long enough and a bit too dark, and ended up getting another wig. And then not doing the costume anyway.

Now while this may seem magical and all, the overall fiber quality and type needs to be taken into consideration. Many curly wigs, especially shorter ones and those with smaller and/or tight curls, and most definitely the lower cost "costume" ones, are not really intended to be straightened and have coarser, or at the very least less "silky" fiber. Possibly by design, as coarser fibers would hold curls or a set-in style better, possibly for cost cutting, but the point is that some wigs will just not have the same flowing quality as a normal straight wig once they are down. Longer wavy wigs tend to be fine though, and you can usually gauge it just by feeling the wig hair with your fingers. The straightened afro above definitely had a slightly stiff feel to it in the end but I didn't mind as it was going to be spiked and mussed up and some coarseness is beneficial to that.

All about irons.

First, while this will sound like I'm randomly giving a sales pitch for high-priced irons, I don't mean it that way, but you get what you pay for; it is totally worth it. I really like Rowenta irons and don't think I can ever go back to using a cheap $15 iron. Sure, they function, but there's so many nice things about a high-quality iron that just make it worth it. The Rowentas just glide across the fabric, and the steam functions are fantastic. Being able to pump out big blasts of hot steam makes ironing out creases and pressing seams go so much faster. Plus, with the higher end irons you can even use the steam with the iron held vertical, so you can aim it at, say, a shirt on a hanger, and steam it right there. Take all that with the fact that they heat up very quickly, hold a good amount of water that is difficult to accidentally spill, and have various safety features like auto on/off when the desired temperature is reached along with a light to let you know when it's ready. Either way, there could very well be other great brands out there that I haven't used, but I definitely recommend these from personal experience, and after years of semi-disposable cheap irons that were totally unpredictable, it is a welcome change to be able to iron a shirt in just a minute or two

My only real objection is that there has been an occasional bout of quality control issues within the past few years that I address [link] here, but since I am able to handle them myself and don't run screaming to the internet about my evil iron, I'm ok with it. On the upside, I keep finding them at bargain prices used ($4-8 for a $50-100 iron? yesplz) and end up giving them a little bit of TLC and passing them on to friends (who have been using things like horrible 25 year old scarred and burned hand-me-down Black and Decker beasts) as gifts.

That being said, there's a lot of things that apply to all irons that will help you out, so I'll go ahead and stop singing praises for an iron company now. Ahem.


To start, clean your freaking iron. If you can look at the soleplate (the part you iron with) of your iron, and it looks like a mess, you're only harming yourself by being lazy.

First off, don't leave water in your iron all the time as it can lead to rust and limescale. If you know you're not going to be using your iron for a while (say a week or more) go ahead and dump it out, that 30 seconds you will save not having to refill it is not worth it. This is 10x so if you use tap water. I'll admit, while i know that it's better to use distilled water, I don't always have some on hand, so I'll use tap water. You can avoid some of the problems from tap water by not leaving it in the iron all the time, however, you will need to descale your iron sooner or later.

However, some irons do include a form of water softening in them, you'll usually know if they do, with most that do you can actually see the object right inside of the water reservoir through the window as well as some kind of wording indicating it, for instance most Rowentas have this feature. For this reason they actually recommend not using distilled water and instead using tap water (or at least bottled spring water if you have unusually hard tap water) allegedly because the distilled water will actually decrease the performance of the built-in cleaning and can lead to other issues.

Either way, there's a few ways to know if your iron needs descaling:
Have you had your iron for more than a few years, always using tap water? It's time.
Do you occasionally get spitting from the steam holes, or even worse, discolored water or or black/white specks? YES.
Does your iron have this weird whitish build up that looks sort of like dried salt or rock blocking up the steam holes? Holy crap, does someone need to confiscate your iron? Yes, it needs it.

Even if none of those apply, it still can't hurt to do it periodically as it will greatly help the performance of your steam iron. Please note: this will be kind of stinky. It requires vinegar, which I absolutely hate the smell of, but am willing to consider it a necessary evil. Open a window.

Take your iron, cold, and pour a bit of white vinegar into it. If you can see the reservoir, fill it about halfway. If not, about 1/4 cup or so. Top it off with a bit of water, and then turn it on. Let it heat up, and then put it on the highest steam setting. Iron something unimportant, like an old towel or t-shirt. If you have a steam button, periodically press it to generate steam. After you've been doing this for a few minutes, turn off the iron and let it sit upright for a few more minutes. You will then want to pour out the vinegar water by turning the iron upside-down with the spout pointing straight down, over a sink. I like to give the iron a few side-to-side shakes right before I do this just to loosen anything left. Then refill the iron with clean water, and repeat the process of heating up and steam ironing. Note: This does work better if you are using bottled water. Then pour out this water and you should be good to go. If your iron is still having issues, the build-up might be so bad you need a second treatment. There are going to be extreme cases where you might need something more potent (CLR, or the like), but in 99% of the cases, just vinegar will be good enough and you don't want to put extra wear and tear on by using a harsh chemical all the time. PS: if you own a garment steamer of some type you should also periodically descale it in the same manner, for the same reasons.

Next, the soleplate. Is it stained and discolored? Does it have patches of burned on who-knows-what, like from that time you accidentally ironed the wrong side of fusible interfacing, or using starch? Get it off there.
There are various make-it-yourself home concoctions, but I recommend just getting hot iron cleaner, the brand I've used is Faultless and it works well. It's about $2 for a package, so it's worth it to get something that just works for what it's made for.
There is a Rowenta brand that is recommended if you have one of their irons but the product seems to be functionally identical, other than including special cleaning cloths and being about 5x the price ($12-13, usually). I would probably get it if I had one of their irons with a special soleplate (titanium, platinum), but since I just have the stainless steel I'm not too concerned.

Now, get a clean rag, I tend to use cut up t-shirts or towels, and get the iron hot and ready. Also, open a window if you can, and/or turn on a fan, as it produces a bit of smoke that has quite a weird smell to it. Fold over the rag a few times because the product will steam up a bit and you don't want to burn your fingers. Now, squeeze the contents of the tube (all of it if it's the single use one, or the directed amount if it's the larger tube) onto the rag. Carefully but firmly wipe the rag across the iron in smooth motions from top to bottom. The grime should just wipe away. If your iron is especially bad, you might need a second wiping, but as long as the rag isn't getting too dirty you can always focus on problem areas until the cleaner is burned away/used up on the rag. Then, using either a fresh rag or unfolding the rag to get a clean side, wipe the iron in the same way to get the residue off of the iron. I generally do a "test run" ironing on a scrap of something first, just in case there's any residue, as it can make an oily streak if there is any left.
Now, if your iron has rust, or discoloration due to heat or tarnish, this cleaner will probably not do much for you. The only real option I know of is to make a paste of baking soda and water and gently rub it onto the (cold, or if you're adventurous, gently warm from being turned off a short time ago) soleplate with your fingers. Anything much harder with scratch the finish, and even rubbing too firmly with the paste will scratch it. If you have a teflon-coated iron (black or dark gray coating instead of silvery metal) you will probably want to skip this step as any abrasion can wear down the teflon causing it to chip off later, especially if it's already weakened from other wear and tear. Once you're done, rinse off the soleplate well and wipe it with a clean cloth to get any remaining paste off. Unfortunately irons that have gone a little too far will be permanently discolored, especially in the case of severe tarnish or rust. While cleaning it will certainly make it iron a bit better, it won't be 100%, which is why it's good to never let it get to that point. ahem.

Hmm, what else is there? Really, not much, keeping your iron in good condition will preserve the life and keep it in good working order as well as being less annoying to use.

As far as ironing boards go, I've noticed that a lot of boards and covers include a thin foam under padding that wears out over time, this is less effective for ironing and can eventually cause the metal pattern of the ironing board to press into the fabric when you iron it. The fiber pads are much better to use, and are relatively inexpensive, so upgrading to that is not a bad idea if you have one of the foam kind, they basically feel like a thick wooly pad and are either separate, or fused to the underside of the cover. They really do make a difference when pressing and steaming.

Also, this is going to sound a little weird, as I found it in some housewife tips book from the 1950s, but it really works. If you put a sheet of aluminum foil on the board and under the cover, it will make ironing work much faster, it seems to help retain the heat as well as reflect some of it back upwards. The only downside is that if you go crazy with steam the moisture can accumulate, but it evaporate shortly after in most cases. There are also ironing board covers that have a metallic treatment in them, they are sort of a dull silver, but I've found that they seem to wear out kind of quickly with use and after washing a few times.


EDIT- I just recently discovered that you can buy aluminized fabric by the yard at joann's specifically for making ironing board covers....I am going to check that out and see if it performs as well or better than using aluminum foil, if it's a layer under the cover I imagine it would hold up better than as being the actual ironing surface.

Finally, if your ironing board has a tray to lay the iron down in, use it. If you don't have one, you can get one that clamps on, or else get a silicone pad to rest the iron on. while you fuss with straightening this or that before you iron it. A standing iron will very easily do a backflip off of the ironing board from a stray elbow, bump, or jostle. Laying it down fixes that and prevents it tumbling from anything but the most violently clumsy attacks. For whatever reason, despite the fact that my board has a tray on it, I always insisted on standing the iron up while I did other things, and I knocked it down many times leading to unfortunate broken and/or leaky irons, scuffed up teflon plates, burned floor, and in one case a burned hand when I intelligently decided to try and catch the iron rather than letting it hit the floor.

Wigs, and their upkeep. (Or something like that)

Well, it seems I'm talking about wigs again. Guess that's just what I have on my mind since I've been working on several for the past few weeks.

So now, what I consider the essentials for taking care of wigs.

First off, get one of these:

It's a wig clamp, and lets you anchor a styrofoam wig head securely to a counter or tabletop so you can do whatever with it. I used to use all kinds of rigged up things, like an ikea paper towel dispenser and duct-taped to the counter, until I found out how inexpensive they are. I had assumed they were pricey, but they can be found for around $10 at places like Sally's and other beauty supply places and online. They make life so much easier.

In addition, get some T-pins. While most pins and pin-like things will also work, I've found the best results with T-pins and once again, also not very expensive, and they won't surprise you by suddenly pulling out of the styrofoam like most straight pins will.


Also, get a detangling comb. Also inexpensive ($1-2) and I find it indispensable; it works really well for its intended purpose, as well as for general snag-free combing and is ideal when straightening a wig as well. They have two sets of rounded teeth, widely spaced and offset in a zig-zag


If you do need to detangle a wig that has become really bad, you will probably want to condition it first, and the key to detangling a wig properly is time and patience. Start at the bottom of the ends and slowly work your way up. While using this type of comb does make it more straightforward, you will still want to get in there with fingers at times to work out tangles, the worst thing you can do is rough up the wig some more and manhandle it, some hair loss is unavoidable with the worst knotting, but by taking your time you can keep it to a minimum and maybe not have wigs suffering from severe thinning.

Oh right, I said something about conditioning. This is one place where everyone has a different idea. Some use normal shampoo and conditioner, some use soap, some use other products like fabric softener. While I hear fabric softener works well and adds an anti-static protection to the wig, I have a contact allergy to many fabric softeners so I don't use them (and would rather not experiment to see which ones I do and don't, if I've never bothered to need it for clothing, why bother now). One of the things that I found with using normal hair products on wigs is that some of them, especially the conditioners, don't have the desired effect. It is most likely due to the fact that they are formulated to absorb into human hair, which is porous and made of protein, as opposed to the sealed plastic fiber of a wig. Because of this, I've found most conditioners simply rinse away, leaving no benefit to the wig other than a faint smell, or leave a very tangible oily or waxy feeling on the wig that also ends up affecting styling. That was when I discovered wig shampoo/conditioner. (A product that is made specifically for the use I am looking for? How novel. Why didn't I think of it before.)

The first brand I've used, and have been using for some time, is IC Wig.
It's pretty handy in that the bottle is marked with lines showing how much you need to use, you simply fill the sink up with cool water and then measure out one amount of the liquid into the water. Then holding the wig, dunk it and gently swirl it around a few times, then rise it under cool water until it runs clear and doesn't feel overly slimy. This product does a great job of cleaning and leaving slight conditioning in the wig which makes detangling much easier, and preventing future tangles, without changing the effect of styling products like glue or hairspray. Plus, and it helps if you use lukewarm water instead of cold (not hot),  you can remove almost any styling product buildup in the wig very easily.
While each bottle only costs $3-6, depending on where you get it (I have gotten it for the higher end at Sally's, and the mid to lower end at local wig stores), there are only 3 or 4 measured "uses" per bottle. For this reason, I will often line up several wigs to condition at once rather than waste a sinkful of conditioner, and if it's a short wig or I don't feel I need to wash/condition as much, I will use half the amount. What can I say, I'm thrifty at times. There seems to be two different formulations out there, or perhaps I am just getting bottles that are older/newer depending on how long it has sat on the shelf. Both are an orangey color, but one is a bit lighter and more translucent, the other is a little darker and more opaque, sometimes with a small layer of separated light-colored oil at the top that needs to be shaken back into the solution before using. Both seem to have the same end result, however.

I recently discovered a second brand, which I have been using for about a month, and I am also pleased with it; in addition the price per amount of uses is much better, it's a concentrate and there are many, many, many uses per single bottle. The brand is DeMert and this is what it looks like:


While I found it by chance one day at a stand selling wig and hair products, it seems to be available from many places online. Not only does it work well, but I've found that it very quickly removes any kind of "conditioning" treatment already in the hair. The local wig stores are especially bad with this since all of their wigs are "display" wigs that you buy right off the shelf, so they always have some kind of product in them to keep frizz down and make them look glossy but there has been a rash of wigs lately that I have ordered online that have had something in them as well, causing a slight greasy feel and in many cases a very weird chemical smell. The only real downside to this one is that it definitely has a much more soapy smell. It's not really unpleasant, precisely, but the smell that it leaves lingering in the wig is a bit reminiscent of pet shampoo.  It does dissipate after a bit, however. Since it's basically nothing but surfactants and foaming agents, it basically strips off any kind of soil or oil with a tooooon of suds. It even takes off most ink-based wig dye, though in cases with heavier amounts and multiple coats of dye, even after a few washings some still remains that needs to be removed manually with alcohol and cotton balls. However, a little goes a long way, it says on the bottle to use 1 tbsp in a sink of water, I actually probably only use 1 tsp or so in most light washing cases.
Additionally, it is only a shampoo and the wig will need to be conditioned afterwards if you want to, unlike the IC wig which doesn't clean quite as deeply but leaves it conditioned afterwards. I have now obtained several other of their wig products including a conditioner to see if they work just as well.

Before all of this I would make up my own blend of "shampoo" which was a 2 liter bottle filled with warm water and about a 1/2 cup each of cheap Suave shampoo and conditioner, and half of a small vial of a particular brand of hair oil conditioning treatment (that I can't remember the name of at the moment), shaken together and then poured in small amounts over a wig when needed, then rinsed out. While it did work and was possibly the cheapest option in terms of volume per dollar, I definitely prefer the two other products to it far more.


The final element in this is a steamer of some sort, and I'll go into this more in another post, but I'll touch on it here as well. Steam works wonders for wigs. It's a lot harder to accidentally damage your wig with heat due to the way steam works, compared to a hair dryer or other heat tool. While you can get a very good fabric/garment steamer that holds a gallon or so of water and can be used extensively for the $40-100 range, you can also find less expensive ($15-20) travel-size garment steamers that look something like this

These are very light duty, only holding a small amount of water and meant to be used for a shorter amount of time, but will work just as well for most light wig use. They are great for quickly getting out that big fold that gets set into one side of a bagged costume wig, or getting other parts to lay flat that just won't cooperate and keep sticking up or out. They also work well for straightening the ends of a long wig that has gotten frizzy from multiple tanglings and brushings. Steam will quickly remove curls and other styling by straightening the wig, so keep that in mind. Just take a wide-toothed comb, or preferably a detangling com, and work it through, first pass the steam down the hair from root to end, following immediately behind it with the comb. You can even hold the comb in one hand and the steamer in the other, doing both in one pass together. After just a few passes, you should have a nice, flat, straight, section of hair. For the most uncooperative areas you may need to gently hold the ends of the hair with your fingers pulling it taut as you run steam across it. Now let it cool down and you should be good. Do not use a bristle brush or tug on the hair excessively, and make sure to get out any major tangles before doing this, as the heat will temporarily weaken the fiber and tugging on it can cause it to break off.


Also, if you are looking to buy a better steamer, make sure to get one meant for fabric/upholstery/drapery/garment use as they have a nice continuous flow of gentle steam (and you can also easily use them to steam fabric back into shape). I was not paying enough attention and got a steamer that, while it looked  like the right thing, was actually meant for cleaning floors (and upholstery, but in a more deep-cleaning way); and because of this the steam was pressurized and required constant "charging". While I was able to use it for some time to get results, (and because I couldn't return it and didn't want to waste it) the annoyance was not worth it as it was somewhat like trying to style a wig while blasting it with a hose, you had to aim the steam from a few inches away and on top of that the force of the stream of steam would physically blow the wig around in the process.

Wig Dyeing Part 2: PROFIT.

I decided to break this into two posts since I figured a (even longer) giant wall of text would be a bit boring, and also, it's easy to break the process up into the parts of making the dye and then using it.

Ok, so you have your dye now. Now, how to get it onto the wig.

There's a lot of approaches to this, really. I've known people to pour or brush it directly onto the wig, though that can have very erratic results (uneven, blotchy, etc) and is kind of a waste of dye since it tends to drip everywhere, although this was indeed what I very messily did when I first started trying to color wigs 5-6 years ago. I have also known people to put the wig in a large plastic zippered freezer bag with a large amount of dye to soak. While this also seems to work well, it's hard to get a really intense color, you tend to get more of an all over tint, and also, still a big mess when you pull it out of the bag.

What I prefer is to spray the dye directly on the wig. Personally, I use an airbrush as the control and distribution of the dye is very exact (I have several different models but I always seem to go back to my first which is a vintage Binks Wren I inherited from my father. It just seems to be the best all-around, but I'm sure that's just a personal thing), however I know that most people won't just happen to have an airbrush and compressor laying around, or want to spend money on getting them.

So, the next best thing is a spray bottle of some type. There are many inexpensive semi-disposable bottles out there that you can find in both the toiletries aisle of most department stores as well as in various arts and crafts stores. Both the pump kind with the round button on top and the trigger-sprayer kind will work for this purpose. However, you will want to try a few out. Put some water in one and spray it a few times, see if it makes a nice fine mist, or is it spitty with lots of spattery droplets. You want a fine mist, of course. Even better, put a small amount of your dye in one and spray it a few times onto a piece of paper from a few inches away, and hopefully you will see a nice round circle, nicely gradated from dark to light from the center to the outside. This will be ideal. If you got one of the trigger kind you will probably need to play with the nozzle a bit to get it right, and it seems to be harder to get one that isn't at least a little spattery. [image]

Now, you will want to set up somewhere, preferably outside or at least somewhere with newspapers on the floor and a window open, despite your best efforts there can be spills and it will stink up the house a bit. I have found that a piece of PVC pipe in a christmas tree stand makes a perfect wig head stand for something like this, you can make it a height that is comfortable for you to move around. [image]

Ideally you will section off the hair and work in one part at a time as this will give you better control at getting to the under layers and will help prevent you from over-coloring parts of it, but even I don't often do that as I am a bit lazy, so I usually just have a comb that I hold in one hand as I go, lifting up each section of hair and spraying, working from the top to the bottom. This is where having the more concentrated ink with faster-evaporating alcohol helps as there is less of a chance of saturating the wig. However, with the spray bottle there is still opportunity for that to happen, so be careful, you don't ever want the wig to look noticeably wet, for instance with the dye beading up on it and dripping. Preferably it should have the look of damp hair, fresh from the shower but toweled off. When the wig gets too wet and the dye beads up and drips, it tends to pull some of the dye off as it runs downwards, evaporating in the process, causing you to have light or even undyed parts at the roots and overly dark ends and tips, and even if it doesn't drip it tends to make dark areas where it was overly concentrated.
The best way to avoid this is just take it slow. Spray a few times, run the comb through it lightly, move to another part. As you work your way around the wig you can come back to an earlier part and spray it again. Gently running the comb through (only once or twice, don't go crazy) will help the hair from clumping up as well. Take your time, it's worth it. Check at the roots and around the wig to see if you missed any spots, especially along the edges of the wig, there's always that stray piece that got tucked under somehow.

Once you're all done, I'm sure you'll still poke at it a few times, I know I do, let it sit to air-dry. I usually give it 6-8 hours. Once it's dry, gently run a comb through it again, it's going to feel a little rough but that's ok, you just want to get it running through the hair without snags. Next is the rinsing. This step is optional, but is important for preventing rub-off or running from sweat or moisture, so if you're wearing a wig that is long enough to be brushing your costume in some place, or don't want to risk having a stain on your head somewhere, it's worthwhile.

HOWEVER.

Some wigs do not take dye very well, especially any that use Eleora fiber (this includes most New Look wigs, as far as I know). Eleora specifically, and some other wigs, have a treatment that makes the fiber more soil, wear, and tangle resistant as well as having a softer feel, however this same treatment then acts like a repellant for the dye. Due to this, you may find that you keep rinsing and rinsing and the dye continues to come off until you have blotchy or overly light wig. So, you may want to keep that in mind. I've had a few wigs I chose not to rinse for that reason.

The rest though, I rinse (and even condition if they seem well-behaved). This also helps prevent them from having that straw-like look that a lot of hand-dyed wigs (and all of my early ones) had.
You can either fill the sink with cool water, or start the tub running, your choice. With shorter wigs I like to use the sink because it provides a much easier gauge of how clear the water is, just get it half full, hold the wig by the crown, and dunk it in a few times. If the water gets noticeably dark, drain and repeat. With luck, after the second time it will be pretty much clear. If it seemed like not much ink came off and it is not in risk of stripping the dye I will put a capful of liquid wig conditioner in the last dunk, making sure to then rinse the conditioner off well as this will definitely improve the overall look and feel of the wig.

Pat the wig dry with a towel you don't care too much about in case some of the dye rubs off, once again to damp but not dripping, and then leave it to dry somewhere.


And...that's about it. I feel like there is another part, but rereading this it all seems complete, so that is that. If I think of something else I will come back and add it.

Next up: Wig maintenance, or something like that.

Wig Dyeing Part 1: Creating your dye

One of the things I've noticed when looking at others' guidelines for how to dye wigs is that everyone seems to do it differently, sometimes in significant ways and sometimes in subtle ways. In addition, it always seems like a key step is left out here or there, possibly just because it's assumed to be logical, but having been there myself, it's often puzzling at times. Plus, there's often too many "always this" and "never that" type things, and while there are some absolutes, there are many slightly different routes to take to reach a result.

Therefore, I felt like writing down, not so much a how-to, but a "how I do it". This is not to assume that my way is the best, but hey, it works for me. Maybe it will for you as well. Plus, it prevents people having to "reinvent the wheel" so to speak and maybe avoid some of the mistakes I have made. My routine will differ from many others because I tend to work in small amounts with large concentration of ink, for several reasons, but can be adjusted to your own method that you choose.

First off, the materials.

Isopropyl Alcohol 90-92%.

You can get large bottles of this relatively inexpensively at drug and/or department stores, get the large bottles, you'll use them. I recommend this over the lower-percentage rubbing alcohol (while 70% is the most common I've also seen 50%) for several reasons. First, the evaporation rate is much faster which means that there is less chance of running, and it is ideal to use in an airbrush for that reason as well (more on that later). Second, in my experience, it seems to have better "grab" for the ink, as far as taking hold on the wig with minimal rubbing or rinsing off, and if you are using the Sharpie method you don't need to soak the fiber nearly as long to extract the ink. Finally, the higher percent is what you will want to use for cleanup, both small mistakes on the wig (overspray, etc), drops on the floor or counter, or even worse, having to strip a whole wig of a botched job (messy but possible in most cases).
[image]

Now, for the ink to use as the colorant/pigment for the dye (and where to get it).
Wig dye is actually kind of a weird catch-all term as some of the things we are using count as pigments and some as dyes by nature, but they are all colorants in the end. For the purpose of clarity I will continue to just refer to it as "Wig dye" since that is the norm and splitting hairs over the difference isn't going to accomplish anything other than being boring.




Sharpie markers.

Sharpies are the most commonly used item, and for good reason; they're easy to come by in a large range of colors and fairly affordable. Messy to deal with, wear gloves if you want, or look like a weirdo with colored stains on your hands and around your fingernails for a few days afterwards because it's hard to avoid staying completely clean. I usually end up with the stained hands. Sharpies can be used directly on the wig for more intense results, but not only is this process a bit tedious, it can be hard to control especially as the marker begins to dry or run out of ink. Plus, this whole thing is focusing on the idea of wig dye.

The best method I've found involves small clear plastic bottles like the kind you would get soda, juice, or bottled water in, so set aside two of those beforehand. Ideally you would have a pair of needle-nose pliers with a wire cutter at the base, but if you have just basic wire cutters that will work too. Cut off the very base of the marker right below the rounded end. If you go any farther down you will "bite" the ink capsule and it will ooze and make the next step messier. Hopefully, you should be able to see the ink tube right there, if you have needle-nose pliers, great! Just grab it by the end and pull it out. If not, will, you can usually fish it out with a pin, or a toothpick, or something, just by stabbing it into the tube and hooking and pulling upwards. If you haven't shaken the marker or squeezed the tube in this process, it should be relatively clean on the outside. Gently set it aside on something unimportant, a piece of cardboard, a paper plate, etc. I usually do two markers at once to save time and make sure I don't run out of ink. Now, using an razor knife or a pair of very small, sharp scissors (the small thread scissors for embroidery work well, but you're going to need to clean them up afterwards), slit the ink tube straight down the middle lengthwise. I then scrape the fiber filling out of the tube with the pliers or a popsicle stick, which is always a mess, but makes the process a little quicker in my experience.

Take either the pile of inky fluff, or the split-open tube if you skipped the last part, and drop it down into the first bottle. Pour about an inch to inch and a half of alcohol over it, basically enough to cover it fully depending on how big of a bottle you picked. If you left the tube intact in which case if it's standing on its end just put a bit of alcohol in the bottom. Cap the bottle and shake shake shake for a few seconds, and then carefully pour off the liquid into the second bottle. If you did the "messy scraped out fluff" route, the big wad of fiber should catch in the neck of the bottle and you can even gently squeeze the sides of the bottle to wring more of the dye out. If you did not, you'll have to be careful that the tube doesn't slither out and fall into the second bottle. Repeat this 2-3 more times, you should begin to see the fibers get noticeably lighter until they look like they have barely any ink left in them, at which point it's time to stop. You now have a "master" batch of ink that you can use, lightening is as simple as just diluting with more alcohol, but be careful, the color that it looks in the bottle will not be the same as the wig, so test it before you make any changes you can't undo.

Do not use paint Sharpies, which are oil-based. This currently includes all metallics except silver (see below).
Fluorescent Sharpies are usable but will give inconsistent results as the the fluorescent component separates from the pigment when you dissolve it in alcohol and does not have quite the same effect on wig fiber as it does on paper.
Pastel Sharpies are in a similar situation, they will work, but due to the way they are formulated you will not always get the color you are expecting from the marker, and you will need to have some trial and error. For instance, the pastel pink sharpie will yield pale orangey-peach dye with a bright yellow-orange pigment floating at the top. However, I have had some good results with most colors I've tried, but still had the best luck with mixing the basic primary and secondary colors when trying and get a specific shade.
Black Sharpies are actually a very dark purple (quite noticeable when diluted) and will not yield true black results.
Metallic Sharpies are handled slightly differently. There used to be Copper and Gold, but now Silver is the only one that remains. The pigment in these does not fully dissolve in the alcohol and will settle to the bottom of the container when left sitting. This has a benefit in my case, however; I will take several (very small) containers and pour the liquid in them, allowing them to settle for a day or two, then gently pour off much of the extra alcohol, then shake them up and pour them all together. Given time, this will allow you to achieve a much higher concentration of pigment, although you will still want there to be at least 1/2-2/3 of the solution to be liquid when it is settled. Silver comes in handy in several ways, not only can it be used to add silver color to wigs, but it is opaque and can be used on black and other dark wigs with obvious results. Additionally, because it is opaque and metallic, a small amount of it can be used on a dark wig to give it a "frosted" look with the effect of lightening it slightly without making it too obviously silver-colored. However using too much of this color will build up on the wig giving it a very matte, chalky appearance as well as making the fiber stiff. I recently found a source for (albeit slightly overpriced) Gold Sharpies that claim to be alcohol/water based but have not yet tried them out to see how well they work.


Other brand Art Markers
Other artist markers can be used using a similar method, I have known people to use Prismacolor and Design markers to color wigs, but in my experience they are either too pricey for me to justify wasting (when something else works just as well and you get more for less), or too risky (many art markers use some other type of solvent that could at best be incompatible with the alcohol method or at worst, cause damage to the wig fiber).





Acrylic Artist Ink
These are actually better to use in my experience as they come in dropper bottles and can be measured out very easily to achieve exact shades and blends, and are easy to reliably reproduce provided you keep track of what amount of what you used. In theory, most waterproof or water-resistant colored acrylic ink that is listed as sold for drawing and technical pens should work, but I've had luck with these brands and am always trying out new things to see if I'm missing out on anything. I have used the following products with good luck and positive results.

EDIT: Initially this was its own section but the selection got big enough that I have broken it off into its own post for better readability/information, Artist Inks for Wig Dying review. [link]

I prefer to store my prepared dye in in either 1-2ml airbrush jars, if I have extras to spare, or small 1oz screw-top plastic bottles from the art store. I don't know if they have a specific name, but they're somewhat like a half-height test-tube with a flat bottom, stocked in the paint section so presumably, for storing paint.
[image]


Next up: Spray, splash, pour, soak? Dying the wig.