A hair closure is essential to conceal an installation of a hairpiece and give you a natural look. The hair closure consists of a lace with real human hair hand-tied to it for the coveted natural look. The lace material can either be transparent or HD, with each type offering key advantages.
You’ll choose between transparent or HD lace, depending on what you’re looking for in the lace closure. What’s right for you might not be right for another wearer. You’ll decide for yourself after knowing the key differences between the two lace types.
The Importance of Lace Closures
Many individuals embrace lace closures for their importance, regardless of whether they feature transparent or HD laces.
Natural-Looking Hairline
Lace closures can perfectly mimic your natural hairline to give you the natural look you desire. The lace seamlessly blends with your scalp, making it look like you’re not wearing an extension hairpiece.
Endless Styling Options
With real human hair meticulously hand-tied to the lace, the lace closure feels and moves like natural hair. You can style the extension hairpiece in endless options just like you would with your natural hair. Besides, the hair strands are all natural and can be styled or colored like natural human hair.
Hair Protection
An extension hairpiece measuring 4×4 covers enough area on your head to protect a large portion of your natural hair. Instead of styling your natural hair with curling irons, the extension hairpiece will be taking the brunt.
Key Differences Between Lace Materials
While both lace types offer benefits like natural-looking hairlines and versatile styling, you can expect them to have differences between the two lace materials.
Lace Material Appearance
Transparent Lace: Transparent lace is clear and requires proper installation to avoid being visible on your scalp. Since this lace material has a clear, noticeable color, it requires tinting to match it with your skin tone. If you don’t tint it properly, it will be noticeable on your scalp.
Transparent lace provides a decent natural look as it seamlessly blends with your skin if you put in the extra work. Tinting this lace makes it smoothly transition from your skin for the natural-looking hairline you aim to achieve.
HD Lace: HD lace is ultra clear and virtually unnoticeable on your scalp. This particular lace material has an ultra-thin construction that makes it undetectable. However, you still want to apply it correctly on your head for a seamless blend with your natural hairline.
HD lace is a premium choice for its flawless creation of a highly natural hairline. It conforms to your scalp and blends with your skin tone without you tinting it. If you want a more natural hair extension, this lace option is the best choice. But that’s going to come at a premium cost.
Durability
Transparent Lace: Transparent lace is clear and more noticeable because it has extra materials. More precisely, it’s a thicker lace material. The extra material makes it more robust and therefore durable to withstand rough handling during installations.
If you’re a wearer who doesn’t take great care when handling an extension hairpiece, you’ll find transparent lace capable of withstanding your rough treatments. However, that’s not a ticket to mishandle your transparent lace hairpiece.
HD Lace: HD lace is ultra-thin, which can only mean it has fewer materials. That makes it more vulnerable to rough handling. As a thinner and more delicate material, HD lace can easily tear if your handling is a bit rough.
The only times you want to be extra careful with this lace is during installation or when taking off the installed extension hairpiece. You also want to be careful when maintaining your hair because this lace is fragile.
Ease of Blending
Transparent Lace: You’ll prepare a transparent lace first before installation. The preparation usually involves bleaching the knots. You’ll then apply this lace correctly and ensure you cut the lace to align with your hairline.
Keep in mind that the color is clear and easily detectable. For this reason, you’ll tint the lace to match your skin tone. Although transparent lace can be tinted to match various skin tones, it works best with lighter skin tones.
Lighter skin tones don’t require as much work to blend the transparent lace with your skin compared to darker complexions. If you have a darker skin tone, you’ll do the extra work to match the color of this lace with your complexion.
HD Lace: This lace is more versatile since it works great with any skin tone. HD lace still requires work to blend seamlessly with some skin tones. However, the work is not as labor intensive as working with a transparent lace.
Unlike the clear-colored transparent lace, this one is translucent for a flawless blend with any skin complexion. Its exceptional blending with various skin complexions makes it a go-to lace option.
Ease of Installation
Transparent Lace: Beginners will appreciate the ease of installation that this lace option affords them. Its extra thickness makes it more sturdy and easier to handle during installation. Securing it on your scalp with adhesive is much easier, making it a beginner-friendly option.
HD Lace: The ultra-thin HD lace is less sturdy and more delicate to handle. Professional hair stylists and seasoned DIY enthusiasts are the only people who can install this lace correctly. Beginners will experience a lot of challenges aligning this lace with their hairlines for a flawless natural look.
Comfort and Breathability
Transparent Lace: Apart from aesthetics, transparent lace differs from HD lace. While still breathable because it’s a mesh, transparent lace has a thicker material that might irritate some skin types. This might cause discomfort for some individuals.
HD Lace: HD lace is also breathable and performs at par with transparent lace when it comes to breathability. It provides more comfort since the ultra-thin mesh sits comfortably on any skin type. What’s more, the lace is very lightweight and barely feels present on your scalp.
The ultra-lightweight design brings more comfort. Since HD lace has more benefits than its transparent lace counterpart, it usually costs more.