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GENERAL INFORMATION: Dreads to Sell, Dreads to Wear, and Dreads that Suck
For a novice who may have never actually purchased dreads or seen them in person before, it can be difficult to determine when your work is good quality and when you probably shouldn't leave the house wearing it.
What Is Sellable?
Your dread falls are ready to sell when your ends are perfect (as explained in last month's column), when the dread as a whole is in a uniform shape without lumps, and most importantly, when they're durable.
As for the uniform shape, your dreads don't need to be perfect, smooth sticks of hair -- but they do need to have some sort of order to them. Note the first example:
As you can see, there are small bits of frizz sticking out off of the dreads, but there are no large loops of hair and they all have an even taper. These dreads look relatively natural, but they're also neat and tidy. It is perfectly normal to have small amounts of frizz on your dreads. Most cameras don't pick them up, but trust me: nearly every dread you see in a picture online DOES have a little bit of frizz. Don't panic if yours do too ;)
Here's another example of a full set of falls. Note that the dreads are thick at the top and taper down to skinny ends; you can also backcomb more or less than I do to get a more or less dramatic taper than what is shown. Also notice that there are no uneven parts of the taper: there aren't any lumps or thick spots as you go down the dreads. If your dreads don't have an even taper, they're not seller-quality.
Finally, and most importantly, your dreads need to be durable! If a person pays you for a set of falls, they should be able to wear them more than once. The key to durability is thorough backcombing; by using the two tests below, you'll be able to determine if you've backcombed your dreads enough.
Durability Test #1: Hold your dread out sideways. It should stick out at least a few inches from where you're holding it before it starts to hang straight down. This is because of the backcombing: if your dread is nice and solid at the top, it won't bend as much. That is not to say that sellable dreads must be completely stiff; they just need to have a little bit of solidness to them.
Durability Test #2: SMASH THEM! Don't literally try to destroy your dreads, but put something heavy on top of them like a text book. Do your dreads go completely flat? They shouldn't if you've backcombed them thoroughly.
Note that the dreads above are still showing beneath the weight of library and information science. They are solid enough to hold up my extremely boring textbooks.
What Is Wearable?
Basically, if you're almost at the point of seller quality but you're not quite perfect, your falls are probably wearable.
If they're mostly neat with a lump here or there, go ahead and wear them. Tiny burns at the ends? If you don't care, you're probably fine.
Here's an example of a wearable set of falls that isn't quite selling quality. Note that there are some uneven and loose spots and the ends of a few dreads could use work, but overall, there's nothing glaringly wrong.
Many dreads look perfect but aren't durable enough to sell. If your dreads look like the positive example pictures but they get squished when you try the textbook test, wear them all you like. You might have to reseal them later, but you'll look fine in them for a wearing or two.
What You Shouldn't Leave The House In
Now, onto the fun part: examples from when I was learning how to make dreads (and doing a very poor job of it!) Let us commence with the criticism.
Both of the example images basically have the same problems, so I will discuss them together instead of seperately.
First off, the ends are a mess. Notice that a few of the dreads at the bottom of the red/pink set have very thick ends; these will unravel very quickly. There's also a bit of fraying on both sets because the ends are not sealed, just trimmed.
Next, notice all of the weird kinks at the thinner bottom parts of the dreads. These are the result of twisting too tightly (which can happen easily of you use a Conair braid machine to do your ends). If your dreads have kinks like this, pull them straight and reseal them. Doing so will remove the kinks and give you nice, straight ends.
Now let's talk about uneven tapering -- because wow, these are a mess! The lavender and baby pink dreads are especially easy to spot. Notice that they go from fat to medium to fat again. This is the result of uneven backcombing; if you get a knot part of the way down your dread, you need to pull it apart and work with it until it evens out. If you don't, you'll end up with lumps.
Another issue is that they are not thoroughly sealed. You can see this by looking for the little beads that have been added to the falls (more are visible on the pink/red set). See how the beads squish the dreads down? That's because they're not backcombed, twisted, or sealed tightly enough. A thoroughly backcombed dread will not give way that much to squeeze a bead onto it.
And finally, the durability test: I don't have these anymore to give you photo examples, but rest assured that they would disappear under a textbook (or a magazine, for that matter).
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