Let’s face it. Most of the time, surfers are depicted in movies and TV shows with blonde hair. The movie Point Break features blonde-haired Patrick Swayze in a surfing competition against Keanu Reeves. Swayze’s hair was bleached to give him “the surfer look”. Surfers typically have blonde hair, and we accept it as the norm.
But why do surfers have blonde hair? They have blonde hair because the sun’s ray bleaches their hair. Not only that, but the salt water also lightens the hair when combined with the sun.
The longer surfers – or any beach lover – stays out in the sun, the lighter their hair will become. To understand exactly why this happens, we need to take a look at the process close up.
How Does Hair Become Lighter From Surfing?
People who surf stay out in the sun for many hours at a time. The longer someone stays at the beach and goes into the water, the lighter their hair naturally becomes. The key factors involved in the hair lightening process are the sun, salt water, melanin, and keratin. Both the sun and salt water combine to change your natural hair color.
When you spend a day lying on the beach, soaking up the sunshine, your skin gets darker. The sun stimulates the production of melanin in the skin. Melanin is your skin’s pigment, and the more melanin your skin produces, the darker you become.
However, the opposite occurs with your hair. The sun’s rays break down the melanin in your hair, making it produce less and less. The sun removes your hair’s natural color
The people who spend the most time at the beach are the men and women who surf. Surfing is one of those things that attracts a person to the beach, often to remain for hours on end, day after day. Over these long hours of sun exposure, the color of the hair changes from a darker to a lighter color.
If you have dark brown or black hair, or even red hair, it’s not likely your hair will turn blonde. My hair is light brown, so the transition to blonde is much faster. A dark-haired woman will retain her dark locks even after long sun exposure.
How Does Salt Water Change Hair Color?
We’ve seen how the effects of the sun break down melanin in the hair, literally bleaching the color out of hair. Changing hair to blonde requires one more step, and this is where surfing comes in.
Surfers spend hours out on the water, either just floating, or paddling, or being challenged bigger and bigger water swells. The natural state of hair in the ocean is to be wet. But wet ocean hair isn’t drinking water. It’s salt water, and that’s where the difference will change hair color.
Keratin is a “protective protein,” and has elasticity. Its purpose is to protect parts of the body where it is found, such as in nails, skin, and hair.
The salt in ocean water strips your hair of its keratin content, pulling apart the microscopic elastic keratin bonds and exposing the hair directly to the salt. The salt opens up cuticles in the hair and this depletes your hair of the keratin and its moisture.
The salt in the ocean removes the color from hair slowly. Constant, daily surfing will ultimately produce hair that’s lighter in color. Also, hair is being clobbered by the rays of the sun, so the combination of salt water and the rays of the sun will lighten hair naturally.
Surfers’ hair will be blonder in the summertime than during the winter months. One of the reasons is because the hours of sunlight each day are longer in the summer months than wintertime.
When the weather is warmer, the ocean temperature is also warmer. Surfers will spend more time in the warmer water of summer than they will in the colder winter water.
Surfers are attracted to oceans that have a lot of swells, and bigger waves occur at different times of the year. However, a lot of surfers will go out anyway if the weather is nice, paddle about on their boards and take whatever waves come to them. The sun and the salt combine when you’re out in the ocean to make your hair lighter.
How Can I Get Surfer Blonde Hair?
Surfer hair has been a fashion statement since the late 1950s, and it’s still as popular as ever. Bands like The Beach Boys popularized the Southern California surfing scene, with songs like “Surfin’ USA,” “Catch a Wave,” and “Little Surfer Girl.” They popularized surfing, even though surfing had already been established in places like Malibu, Huntington Beach, and Newport Beach. Interestingly, none of the Beach Boys themselves ever surfed, nor did they go to the beach that much.
The surfer look shows the true side of actual surfers, independent, a rougher, less tamed attitude, a loner and someone who isn’t interested in conforming to society.
Surfer hair tends to be messy, curly, and wavy. There are a lot of air products out today that, when combined, will produce the light-hired, free-wheeling surfer look.
The first step in achieving surfer hair is to grow your hair as long as possible, as far down as the shoulders. Trim the hair as it’s growing only when necessary. It should grow down to the chins on the sides, the shoulders down the back, and down to the eyes in front. You’ll need a total of 4 inches to play wit to get the look, so the longer, the better.
As you let your hair grow, eat a diet with more protein and minerals in it. This will help your hair to grow as fast as possible. You can also include scalp massages because it is believed this also stimulates hair growth.
Avoid shampooing your hair every day. Creating the messy, unkempt, and wavy appearance of surfer hair requires you to pay less attention to the hair, not more. Whenever you do shampoo, use a conditioner afterward. Conditioner strengthens hair and keeps it healthy.
Finally, when your hair has become as long as you can stand it, find a hairstylist you can trust. Bring with you a picture of the surfer style you want. You’ll be making your stylist’s work easier because you’ve provided a lot of hair for them to work with.
Surfer hair styles can be long and flowing (Patrick Swayze in Point Break), or shorter and messier (Laird Hamilton, famous surfer, and winner of hundreds of competitions).
It’s important to make sure your stylist uses a razor rather than scissors to shape the hair. Cutting with a razor gives the hair a “deconstructed” look, the opposite of styling.
Surfers’ hair becomes sun bleached, and blonde highlights appear. You can ask your stylist to add highlights to more closely emulate the true surfer look.
Maintain your hair after styling using a salt-infused matte-finish product. This gives hair a sun-exposed, windblown appearance.
Always blow dry your hair lightly, without too much heat. Overheating the hair will break it down and cause you to lose the wild and natural appearance of the surfer’s hair.
If you’re looking for a way to get the look as soon as possible, or only for a temporary period, expose your hair to sunshine and apply generous amounts of saltwater spray to the hair.
Of course, the best way to get surfer’s hair is to surf! The hours of enjoyment surfers have out on the water, riding or just lying on their backs on the water naturally changes the hair, making it lighter, less kept, and flowing. You might want to consider learning to surf, and if you do surf, you won’t need to maintain your hair after you’ve achieved the look you desire.
Related Questions
How Did The Surfer Hair Stereotype Become So Popular?
The birthplace of the blonde-haired, anti-establishment, independent surfer comes from Hollywood in California, which is near those same beaches where most of the country’s surfers are found.
Early surfer films such as Beach Party (1963), had plots almost identical to each other. But these movies, made mostly in the 1960s, took place on the beaches of Southern California and depicted blonde-haired young men surfing and speaking in a language only surfers knew.
Do All Surfers Have Blonde Hair?
Not all surfers have blonde hair. However, no matter what your hair color, the effects of the sun and saltwater will eventually break down your natural hair color and lighten the tint of our hair. But not every one’s hair will turn blonde.
Will Too Much Exposure Damage Hair Permanently?
The sun and salt are powerful forces that will have a long-term impact on the hair and body, especially for surfers. The body and hair start to acclimate to sun exposure and adjust naturally.
But hair can become damaged from the sun and salt. If you plan to spend a lot of time surfing but you don’t want to damage your hair, try doing two things: plan ahead for two days in a row where you will expose your hair to the sun as little as possible. Second, use an all-natural shampoo that is not abrasive. Baby shampoo is an excellent choice. Make sure to always use a conditioner.