If you’re coveting the sleek look of a blowout from the comfort of your bathroom, you may have the Dyson Airwrap on your wish list. The luxury tool certainly looks intriguingly futuristic, with a slim silver handle and a bevy of cute, pink-accented attachments that Dyson says can dry, smooth, and curl hair. But considering the whopping $550 price tag, and the added challenge of even trying to find one in stock (which is quite difficult), we think most people would be happier with an excellent hair dryer like the one we recommend from Rusk. The Rusk W8less is on sale this weekend for $58, so you can get your hair just as dry—and keep nearly $500 in your pocket.
Rusk W8less Hair Dryer (with code HOLIDAYREADY)
Deal price: $58; street price: $80
Read our review of the best hair dryer.
I’ve owned the same W8less dryer for more than six years, and it’s just as powerful and versatile as the day I bought it. In fact, I used it twice this weekend: once to dry and style my hair for Thanksgiving dinner, and again to defrost the malfunctioning ice-maker filter in my freezer. Try doing that with an Airwrap.
The W8less is so light—under 2 pounds—that my arm doesn’t turn to jelly before I’ve finished my styling, unlike other hair dryers I’ve owned that required me to follow a training regime to have enough strength to get through a blowout. When I want a smooth style, I roughly dry my entire head until it’s slightly damp, which cuts way down on overall dry time, and then I use the included nozzle and a paddle brush to finish my blowout in sections. The Airwrap’s dryer attachment can also rough dry, except it doesn't include a nozzle so its airflow is less concentrated and leaves the hair more tangled. Then you need to stop and swap to the brush attachment before tackling the final, smoothing step.
Dyson tries to justify the Airwrap’s price by touting its ability to dry and curl hair at the same time. Guess what? I can do that with my Rusk dryer, too: I wrap each section of my damp hair around a $6 round brush while I dry it. Dyson offers different barrels for “clockwise” and “anti-clockwise” curls. I just turn my brush around to achieve the same curl variety with less fuss.
I have fine hair, and I worry about damage, so I use my Rusk on its lowest heat setting, and it still delivers excellent results. Dyson says the Airwrap doesn’t use “extreme heat,” which is smart for anyone looking to keep their hair healthy, but I think that taking two seconds to toggle the settings on my hair dryer is a no-brainer.
The Airwrap is certainly a good-looking and, I’ll admit, compelling piece of machinery. But it doesn’t do much that I can’t achieve with my trusty Rusk dryer with similar effort at a fraction of the price.
No comments:
Post a Comment