How a custom full lace wig is made

Wigs, just like any other fashion material came in and out of the fashion runway. The purpose of wearing wigs has varied through time – from a status symbol, to protection purposes, to luxury, to religious or professional purposes, or even for keeping-your-self-esteem purposes especially when you go bald due to health problems or aging or a side effect of undergoing a chemotherapy treatment. During the earlier times wigs used to be a sign of wealth since these used to be made up of animal skins such as goat skins. But today, with the advent of innovations, technology, and creative thinkers, you can easily find wigs that are created from synthetic materials – a synthetic hair that could look real.

Ever wondered how a synthetic hair is made to look real? This is possible through custom wigs. It’s quite a daunting task but absolutely interesting to see. To make one, a cellophane wrap, filament tapes, a good pencil, pieces of blue paper, polyester, cotton lace, a head-shape canvas or wood called wig block, a fine lace, pins, a giant comb with rows of sharp steel teeth called a hackle, holding card, needle, scissors, the synthetic hair and of course, lots of skill is needed.

First thing to be done is to measure the head of the person the wig is created for. One has to make sure the head is measured from all angles since shapes and sizes of heads vary extremely. Next the head is wrapped in cellophane and twisted under the earlobes. Some filament tapes are placed on the cellophane wrap and sticked all over until it covers the wrap. That is done repeatedly until it already has four layers of tapes. After that, the tape is lifted from the head and put on a wig block, then the client’s hairline is traced. Pieces of blue paper are cut and pinned on the block. This is a good practice so that while the work is done, one can avoid the light to reflect directly to your eyes. After pinning the blue papers, a large size polyester and cotton lace is put on the block and the outline traced earlier is cut. Then a finer lace is pinned over the block.

After that, the hair is repeatedly dragged through the hackle. This process is called hackling. Through this, one can eliminate the weaker strands of hair. Once the hair is blended, it can be cut in two and then pressed into little metal pins over the holding card, the pins on the top card interlocking with the bottom. Afterwards, a few strands of hair are pulled out of the card at a time; these strands are weaved into the lace beginning at the nape to the front of the hair. This process is called ventilating. This will take at least 50 hours of time because manually knotting thousands of strands is required to make a wig. Occasionally the hair needs to be combed to free it from tangles. After knotting, one can try to fit the wig to the client’s head and style the hair as wanted by the customer. This process may be time-consuming especially the weaving part, but the hand-made custom hair wigs, although made from synthetic materials, are more authentic-looking rather than machine-made wigs.