Despite what you may think, even as a beauty editor, there are glam techniques I just can’t master. Ever since my beauty-curious teen years, blow-drying and heat styling have been a struggle. Even now, with shelves of styling products and tools, I rarely reach for a hot tool or a blow-dryer—I usually end up frustrated by the process and disappointed with the results. Years of color, bleach and heat have also taken a toll, and styling often felt like it only emphasized my damaged follicles. All that is to say, I’ve been rather averse to heat-styling and blow-drying for most of my life.
So when Shark Beauty announced the release of its first-ever air-styling meets ceramic hot tool multi-use device designed specifically for use on wavy, curly and coily hair—I was intrigued. The Shark Glam ($449) promises a heat-damage-free experience, and what caught my attention right away is that itcomes in two different variations: Straight/Wavy and Curly/Coily, each with curated attachments for styling different hair types. With a tool as multifaceted and uniquely designed for healthy, easy styling, I took a leap of faith and hoped the Shark Glam would transform my opinion on heat styling and blow-drying as a whole. Read on for my honest experience with the new Shark Glam multi-styler.
Shark Beauty Shark Glam: Before and After
The biggest barrier between me and a blowout has always been time. As a nighttime shower girl, the last thing I want to do after a long day is spend an hour fruitlessly trying to dry my hair and inevitably ending up with frizz, sore arms and a sweaty forehead. I’ve tried several hair tools over the past few years in hopes that one would make drying and styling fast and easy with results that mimic those of a salon blowout, but largely to no avail. So, when I tried the Straight/Wavy Shark Glam, there were two things I was looking for: speedy dry time and a frizz-free, healthy-looking finish. Long story short, the device delivered on both and more.
After washing my hair, I started my Shark Glam routine with the Concentrator attachment, setting the device to Wet to Dry mode and also activating the Scalp Shield function, which made a huge difference in my rough-dry experience. I have a very sensitive scalp, so using hot tools and hair dryers to dry my roots was often uncomfortable, but the Scalp Shield setting made the experience not only painless but also remarkably fast.
I simply lack the hand-eye coordination for a traditional round brush and blow-dryer, so anytime I’ve tried blow-drying my hair I’ve needed to use a drying brush, but often found that my strands don’t feel completely dry without lots of re-doing. That couldn’t have been farther from the truth with Shark Glam. Once my roots were dry, I went in with the Glossi Styler attachment to fully dry my mids and ends, and it took only 11 minutes to fully dry my whole head of rather thick hair—a personal record in my less-than-adept drying experience. I was also pleasantly surprised with how frizz-free, healthy and shiny my hair looked after drying alone, given that I didn’t prep my hair with the pre-styling products I typically need to get soft-looking, silky strands, thanks in large part to the teardrop shape of the Glossi Styler that allows for snag-free styling and root-to-end reach much more easily than a traditional blow-dry brush.
For a damage-free, bouncy blowout, I switched to the 1.25” Coanda Auto-Wrap Curlers. Each set comes with two curlers, one that directs the airflow to the right for the right side of the head and one for the left, taking the guesswork out of a wrap-curling experience. In a whopping six minutes, my hair was fully curled top to bottom, with volume I’d never achieved on my own—I got so many compliments the next day on my salon-caliber blowout, even after sleeping on the curls with no product to help with hold.
While I’m not a fan of my hair styled straight, I was interested to see how easily the device’s Shark Silki attachment was in comparison to the other styling heads, and I was equally impressed. On the rare occasions I have straightened my hair with hot tools or air stylers, I’ve often felt that my strands were never quite straight in that runway-model, glass-hair kind of way. But, with just a few passes of the Shark Silki, I was almost unrecognizable. Not your average straightener, the Shark Silki uses Heat Sense Technology to amp up air flow when the plates are clamped, monitoring and regulating temperature as you style for the most efficient styling experience.
The Bottom Line
As someone who doesn’t heat style often, just one use of the Shark Glam has me rethinking my entire routine, and I’m already planning the next time I can use the device for a bombshell blowout. So, if you’re someone who’s struggled with heat or air-styling in the past, I recommend giving the Shark Glam a try—you might surprise yourself.
