- Joined
- Feb 21, 2024
- Messages
- 18
I posted about this in the restoration facebook group but I wanted to share it here too. After analyzing photos of mint ponies and doing experiments, I figured out a method to get factory accurate curls in the mane (the tail still eludes me). Dancing Butterflies is going to be my subject. The main materials needed are mini perm rods (no more straws and bobby pins!), end wrap papers, and a teasing brush. And if anyone tries this I would love to see the results!
Here is a curl-less Dancing Butterflies I got off ebay, done with the standard neck wrap method.
I hold the hair in the opposite direction of the display side. This way the tension will make the curl nice and tight as I roll it.
I get the hair wet and wrap the end with one of my end wraps, folding it over several times while making sure the hair doesn’t slip out
I take a small perm roller (of the ones I got on Amazon, the salmon, gray, blue, and yellow net the best results), and put it underneath the hair and roll towards the head while maintaining tension and pinching the end of the hair so it doesn’t slip off the roller
See how the curl is rolled away from the display side? That’s the important part. This may take several attempts and fiddling with it, I like to make sure the sides of the curl don’t start coming undone.
Using the built in rubber band, I secure the snap to the other side. The rubber band keeps the hair from unfurling. I found that I need to give a little distance between the root of the hair and where I’ve secured rubber band to achieve the next step.
I then position the roller to fall towards the display side, leaving a length of hair that isn’t in the roller. Curl back, fall forward is the best way to explain it. This is what I noticed on photos of mint ponies with their factory curls, is that the curl always curled away from the display side.
Another angle. You can see roughly how it’s going to look once it’s done. What I do now that it’s done it’s done is take it to a garment steamer and hit it from both sides for about 10 seconds. The steam will pass through the hair and heat it up without melting it, and it doesn’t take very long to dry. If you don’t have a steamer, or don’t want to risk so soft ponies getting their flocking ruined, get the roller wet after the rubber band is secured and let it dry completely like normal.
Here she is once the hair is dry. You can see that nice bouncy curl that sits perfectly on her shoulder, just as Hasbro intended. You can see how the curl falls the same way that Blueberry Baskets and Twilight do (I couldn’t find a photo of Dancing Butterflies with mint curls)
And with some volumizing powder, teasing, and careful sculpting and brushing, voilà! She is done! If you want a tighter curl, you can use smaller rollers, or vice versa. I haven’t perfected a method for replicating the factory curl on the tail yet, perm rods are only giving me barrel curls which isn’t how the factory curl on the tail was done.
Here is a curl-less Dancing Butterflies I got off ebay, done with the standard neck wrap method.
I hold the hair in the opposite direction of the display side. This way the tension will make the curl nice and tight as I roll it.
I get the hair wet and wrap the end with one of my end wraps, folding it over several times while making sure the hair doesn’t slip out
I take a small perm roller (of the ones I got on Amazon, the salmon, gray, blue, and yellow net the best results), and put it underneath the hair and roll towards the head while maintaining tension and pinching the end of the hair so it doesn’t slip off the roller
See how the curl is rolled away from the display side? That’s the important part. This may take several attempts and fiddling with it, I like to make sure the sides of the curl don’t start coming undone.
Using the built in rubber band, I secure the snap to the other side. The rubber band keeps the hair from unfurling. I found that I need to give a little distance between the root of the hair and where I’ve secured rubber band to achieve the next step.
I then position the roller to fall towards the display side, leaving a length of hair that isn’t in the roller. Curl back, fall forward is the best way to explain it. This is what I noticed on photos of mint ponies with their factory curls, is that the curl always curled away from the display side.
Another angle. You can see roughly how it’s going to look once it’s done. What I do now that it’s done it’s done is take it to a garment steamer and hit it from both sides for about 10 seconds. The steam will pass through the hair and heat it up without melting it, and it doesn’t take very long to dry. If you don’t have a steamer, or don’t want to risk so soft ponies getting their flocking ruined, get the roller wet after the rubber band is secured and let it dry completely like normal.
Here she is once the hair is dry. You can see that nice bouncy curl that sits perfectly on her shoulder, just as Hasbro intended. You can see how the curl falls the same way that Blueberry Baskets and Twilight do (I couldn’t find a photo of Dancing Butterflies with mint curls)
And with some volumizing powder, teasing, and careful sculpting and brushing, voilà! She is done! If you want a tighter curl, you can use smaller rollers, or vice versa. I haven’t perfected a method for replicating the factory curl on the tail yet, perm rods are only giving me barrel curls which isn’t how the factory curl on the tail was done.
