Cliniderm: an excellent hairspray for those with sensitive skin

✯ Day 324 of Vintage 365 ✯

To say that I have sensitive skin would be a massive understatement. So temperamental and adverse to most products is my skin that, in chatting about this topic, I can't help but rely the story of when, one day several years, my husband playful blew a shot of condensed air (of the kind used to clean computer keyboards) onto my arm, I got a rash! (yes, a rash from air - it's rather funny, I know.)

My skin was always highly sensitive, but became even more so around when I hit puberty and then again when, at the age of 18, I first became chronically ill. In the years since then I've discovered, through trial and error (and plenty of trips to the doctor to help take care of the ensuing skin irritations), which products I can and cannot use when it comes to everything from laundry soap to face cream, shampoo to even dish soap.

While (knock wood!) I've had relatively good luck with make-up (I can usually wear most better drugstore and department store brands with little to no issue), when it comes to hair care products, things turn ugly very, very quickly.

As a child I suffered in silence with a ridiculously itchy, often red scalp due to the run-of-the-mill shampoo and condition my parents bought for the family. As soon as I was old enough to do so, as a teenager, I began buying my own and experimenting with many brands, but few (even those from the health food store) were of much help in this department.

But, bad as shampoo and its hair care partner in crime, conditioner, were, it was products like mousse, gel, hairspray, hot oil, and volumizer that (generally speaking) seemed to irritate my ridiculously sensitive skin the very most.

From scaly rashes (sorry to be frank) to weeping, open sores after one application (Garnier Fructus, I'm looking at you!), by the time I hit my twenties, I'd had no choice but to pretty much stop using all styling products (which, as you can image, makes wearing one's hair – especially when it’s very fine and straight as a pin like mine –  in vintage styles pretty tricky a lot of the time).

{As this elegant 1957 ad for Revlon Satin-Set hairspray clearly demonstrates, hairspray is often required to achieve the beautiful vintage hairstyles we adore, however for those with highly sensitive skin, finding products that don't bother you can be a significant challenge. Image via clotho98 on Flickr.}

Never one to give up a fight easily though, I kept trying brands (many of which were "natural" or organic) that were designed for sensitive skin. A few were less bothersome than their mainstream counterparts, yet it wasn't until 2009 that I discovered a Canadian brand called Cliniderm at a local Rexall drugstore that I finally found a shampoo, conditioner, and hairspray I could use with virtually no irritation.

At first I almost couldn't believe it. After each shower or time I applied hairspray, I kept waiting for the usual itchiness and redness of contact dermatitis, the dry flaking scalp and/or rash around my hairline and down my neck, but nothing happened. It seemed like a small miracle to say the least.

For over two years now I’ve been using Cliniderms hair care products with great success. Their shampoo and conditioner (which are free of parabens, dyes, perfumes, lanolin, formaldehyde and proteins) are great (though, not overly moisturizing - however one can find plenty of homemade, all natural hair mask recipes online to help counteract the issue of dry hair), but it's their hairspray (which I'd peg as being medium hold) that's saved the day, so to speak, the most.

Thanks to it, I've been able to wear a multitude of hairstyles that require styling product once again. As I was fixing my locks in place recently, I began thinking about how some of you may also be in the same boat, and wanted to share about how I found (and have since used) Cliniderm's hairspray with all of you.

Though it's not that easy to find (to date I haven't found any Shopper's Drug Mart locations here in Toronto that carry it, however some of the Rexall drugstores do), and is a tad pricy (about $16 plus tax per bottle), if you have highly sensitive skin and cannot use most (or any) styling products, Cliniderm's hairspray (pictured below) may be the answer you've been looking for.

 

 

According to Cliniderm's official website, their products can be found at several different chains across Canada - and some, though not the hairspray for whatever reason, can be ordered online through the site Well.ca.

I know that what works for one sensitive skinned person may not work for another, but as someone with both sensitive skin and multiple chemical sensitivies, I feel that Cliniderm's products are the best (from a sensitive skin standpoint), least irritating I've come across so far in my whole life and thus really wanted to share this helpful line with my readers.

As one never know though, how long a product will be on the market (especially a niche item like all natural hairspray), if you have highly sensitive skin and have had success with other brands (such as Suncoat, Kettle Care, Beauty without Cruelty, Organic Excellence, or Free and Clear, all of which are US brands that I've not been able to test out yet myself) I'd love to know about your firsthand experiences.

While having sensitive skin can create many beauty routine challenges, if one is diligent and willing to play the role of guinea pig sometimes, there are often solutions to be found out there that can work for you.

It took about 25 years, but I eventually found Cliniderm and now have the ability to wear hairspray without my super sensitive scalp going into a tizzy – which, let me tell you, makes me a very, very happy vintage hairstyle loving camper!

Can you help me find plastic bobby pins?

One of the single most important – fundamental really – components to creating a true plethora of vintage hairstyles is the humble, time-honored bobby pin. In the days before every pharmacy, beauty counter, and hair salon was jam packed with more styling products than you could shake a curling iron at, bobby pins were one of the most important items in a women’s hairstyling arsenal.

Goodness knows I adore these simple metal grips (and the beautiful packages vintage examples often came complete with), however, I fear the relationship is not one of mutual adoration.

The issue lies deeper than with bobby pins themselves, it rests in a particular metal by the name of nickel. Yes, like many amongst us, I am allergic to nickel. And by allergic I mean ridiculously, insanely, have to avoid nickel like the plague lest I develop a horrid case of contact dermatitis within a matter of minutes (of coming in contact with a nickel containing product) allergic.

Nickel, sadly (for myself and others with a sensitivity to it), appears in countless metal items. It is readily available, relatively inexpensive, and easy to blend into alloys with other metals. Over the years I’ve gotten pretty good at knowing when and where to avoid coming in contact with nickel, and I’ve developed ways to get around using a lot of nickel based items (or finding nickel-free alternatives to them). However there are a few nickel items that don’t seem to have a ready alternatives, one of them being bobby pins.

Though the skin on my scalp is a bit tougher than say that on my neck or arms, if I wear metal bobby pins for even just an hour, I almost always start to develop a red itchy rash(thankfully my hair hides this though!). Yet in order to achieve many different hairstyles, bobby pins really are a key element, and so I’m steadfastly determined to find a either a metal-free alternative or a metal based one that does not contain nickel. I’ve been on this hunt for a number of years and in that time I have only ever found one product that fit the bill.

One delightful day while browsing etsy I chanced upon a seller (Vintage Goodies) who had a package of plastic bobby pins for sale! Once I picked my stunned jaw up off the floor and realized that for the first time ever my keyword search for “plastic bobby pins” had actually yielded a true match, I couldn’t purchase the pins fast enough. (Since finding these pins, shown below, I’ve searched up and down for info on vintage “Magic Grip” pins, but haven’t found anything out. Have you ever heard of this brand before?)


I got them for a song (making the find all the more fantastic!) and though they are clearly a few decades old, I can happily report they work well. I use them with kid gloves (so to speak); the plastic they’re made of has held up well, but you can clearly feel that that it doesn’t have the strength or resiliency of metal. As such I’ve taken to using only a few of my dearly prized Magic Grip bobby pins at a time – and only on days when it’s imperative that I sport a hairdo requiring the use of bobby pins.

I know that chances are that no matter how careful I am with these precious plastic pins, over time they’ll break, the cat might somehow steal one, I might lose a few...you know, just like with regular metal bobby pins. Finding this one package of pins was truly awesome, but the simple truth is that I need a viable alternative to pins containing nickel that I can use without having to treat them like they’re my last bottle of water in the middle of an arid desert.

Internet searches, real world searches (malls, craft stores, beauty and hairdressing supply shops, drugstores, etc) and asking every hairdresser I’ve come in contact with since I was a child have all left me empty handed (save of course for the one pack of Magic Grips). Yet, I have this distinct feeling that plastic bobby pins must exist...somewhere.

My dear readers, in my ongoing search I am turning to you. Have you ever encountered – or do you know of a modern day source for – plastic bobby pins?

By this I mean a plastic version of the standard metal type. Not decorative clips (pretty or fun as they may be), oversized plastic hair pins such as the type sometimes used to achieve a French roll, heavy-duty Scunci brand grips (which are a bit big to be discretely used for some styles, though they are probably the closest thing to a solution thus far), or enamel coated metal pins. Alternatively, a brand of metal bobby pins that is guaranteed to be completely nickel-free would be A-OK, too! (I live in Canada, but have no qualms with buying online if such an item happens to hail from a US or international source.)

This quest to find plastic pins is extra important to me because I happen to have ludicrously sensitive skin in general. As a result there are literally only two or three brands of (organic, sulphate-free, dye-free, perfume-free, etc) hair care products that I can use without, again, breaking out in an unpleasant and very itchy rash. I don’t say this to sound negative, but only because it means that as a result I have very few styling products at my ready (Cliniderm hairspray has proven to be the "safest" solution for my ultra sensitive skin I’ve found so far), making most hairdos even trickier for my bone-straight, ultra fine hair to achieve. Finding a nickel-free alternative to bobby pins would be like opening up a whole new realm of hair styling possibilities to me.

I thank you each for reading this post; I hope I didn’t bore you to tears! I would be greatly appreciate for any light you could help me shed on the search for plastic or nickel-free metal bobby pins, and am in turn more than happy to help any of you hunt down items that may be alluding you.

Humongous heartfelt thanks in advance, everybody!