Hairstyles - The Rose bun / Updos with rope braids

Today's hairstyle tutorial is the Rose bun, or Rope bun, a fairly quick and simple hairstyle involving rope braids. I've seen this style usually referenced as 'Rose bun' when worn as a half-up. I'm not sure if other kind of rope buns would be called 'Rose buns' when they don't look much like flowers/roses :S xD (my rope-braided buns with parandas, or the more elongated rope-braided Chinese buns definitely don't look like a rose xD). I usually just call these rope-braided buns.

• For these styles, I used:

-An elastic without metal for the initial ponytail (if you're going to make an starting ponytail, you can also rope-braid without tying your hair in an initial ponytail).

-Small elastics for the ends (can be removed later on)

-Hairtoys with which to secure the style: Small clips, barrettes, open pins, larger bun pins, hairsticks, etc

-Optional: A paranda (info about making parandas and braiding them into hair here). 

• Steps: 

-Half-up version:

This half-up rose-bun with the rest of the hair in a cinnamon bun:

1. Put part of your top hair into a half-up and secure it with an elastic (the half-up can be higher or lower, involving the whole top half part of your hair or smaller sections). You don't need to tie the hair with an elastic to form a half-up, though - I you don't like elastics, you can directly braid these sections of hair into a rope braid (step 2.). I use both methods, depending on the day.

2. Divide this section of hair into into two parts and rope-braid it. The tighter the rope braid is, the rose effect will be smaller and more intricate; a looser rope-braid will give a bigger, simpler 'rose'.

Rope-braiding tutorials:

-No paranda

-With paranda

The rope braid is, in my opinion, one of the simplest braids alongside the three-strand braid. When you add a paranda, the method is similar: First of all, instead of three sections you want the paranda to have two, given that this braid only has two sections. I do this by dividing the middle strand of the paranda equally between the left and right one. Then you add one section to each section of hair and twist the two combined hair+paranda strands to form a rope braid in the usual fashion. Be extra careful not to let the paranda slide down when you start twisting!

When you finish the braid, secure the end with a small elastic so that the coils don't unravel! You can use a transparent elastic, a small elastic in your hair colour, or just any colour (you can remove it just before securing the bun, or hide it).

3. Now you have a rope-braided half-up, to form the rose bun you start wrapping the braid in a coil - You can start coiling the end of the braid until you get to the elastic/braid base (I think this is the usual method, as seen in other tutorials), or alternatively start at the base and coil the rest over it.

4. Secure the bun with the hairtoys of your choice - If you don't want any hairtoys to show, I'd go with open bun pins, bobby pins and/or spin pins. Small clips at the sides don't hide the rose shape and provide the necessary hold, too. If you want additional decoration, go for a hairstick, a flexi-8, a barrette,...For a larger 'rose', pull genty at the coils to make it looser and larger.

-Variations: For these 'flower-shaped' braided half-ups, you can actually use other braid types, such as three-strand braids or fishtail braids. You can also make not just one, but two or more braids and combine them.

-Full bun version: Repeat the same steps above, but this time you pull all your hair into a ponytail (as high or low as you want). Like before, either secure it with an elastic or just hold it in position in order to braid it without an elastic base. Create a rope-braid as before, and coil it in order to form the rose shape.

• Other rope-braided buns: These don't have the 'rose shape', so I just call them 'rope-braided buns'. The pics I have are all of one-coil Chinese braided buns:

SwordWomanRiona / rionashairblog.blogspot.com.es

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