A protective hairstyle is a hairstyle that is heat free and it requires for you ends to be concealed. They can be either pinned away, twisted or braided. This concept reduces the manipulation of your natural hair, encourages growth retention by preventing breakage, and protects the ends of your hair strands by reducing single strand knots, tangles, and the friction of your hair on clothing. Protective styles also protect your hair from outside elements such as rain, snow, wind, and heat.
Protective styling also saves time these styles can last up to weeks or even a month. This gives your hair time to grow and you more time to do whatever you want besides spending hours on doing your hair.
Examples:
This includes buns, braids, twists, cornrows, french braids, wigs, etc.
This style is a twisted up do which is easy to do and also easy to take down. It great for any work environment or even a fancy dinner. This up do is on the more elegant side.
Box braids or Twists are one of the more common protective styles in the black community because they last very long, are easy to style, and fun to decorate. Although they take a while to do it is all worth it in the end.
Buns are also very common protective styles because they are so many different versions of buns. However, it requires a little more manipulation since they can easily be ruined by weather.