I flew up to Jozi the other day with a bunch of beauties for a string of media launches and, thanks to a crazy amount of rain, one of them got washed out. Eek! Fortunately the PR kindly set us up for the day with a bit of spoilage at Tanaz Hair, Body & Nails in Illovo. (Shot Celeste!) Major props to owner Shelene Shaer who took us all in like a bunch of stray puppies. She even fed us from the little restaurant at the front of her salon, hooked us up with a half hour massage at the on site spa and let us abuse her Wi-Fi for hours.

The best thing, however, was that we all got to experience a L’Oreal Professional Smartbond treatment (R450) and I love, love, loved it!

A treatment that helps strengthen your hair from the inside out, Smartbond is the kind of thing you can include in your colour treatment or just have sommer so to enjoy stronger, healthier hair. For this reason it’s being compared to Olaplex but it works a littlee differently. While Olaplex repairs broken bonds within your hair shaft, Smartbond acts like a ‘lubricant’ when you colour in a bid to prevent them from breaking in the first place whilst bolstering those that are weak. In this way, Smartbond is a lot more beneficial to use when you’re actually colouring your hair but, if used as a stand alone treatment, is definitely does make a very tangible difference.

Once the treatment was applied, I got to hang out in a towel turban for about twenty minutes.

Once this was washed out, I got a quick blow dry and could immediately notice that my hair’s colour looked fantastic. I’d had highlights put in about ten days back and these definitely looked brighter and ‘refreshed’, as though I’d just had them done.

As far as my hair’s texture goes, it felt super duper soft. I kept running my hands down my pony tail and feeling the tips with my fingers which are usually the tiniest bit ‘rougher’ than the rest of my hair due to mild splitting and saying ‘Feel this! Feel how soft it is!’ to the other beauties.

In all, if you’re looking to throw in a treatment when you colour or want a quick reinforcing boost I can highly recommend Smartbond. I haven’t tried Olaplex so I can’t compare the two but I know that Smartbond is less expensive and for me it totally did the trick.

Love, love

Leigh