The Curly Hair Files: Crown Pride Naturals Trial Pack Review

So I am clearing out my bathroom of all kinds of stuff because we are (knock wood spit spit etc.) supposed to be getting a whole new bathroom when we go away on holiday (I cannot convey how excited I am about this!). So anyway we have to empty the bathroom, which is a good opportunity to throw away my nine million hair products I never use - ANYWAY I found I still had a little bit of Crown Pride Naturals stuff left and remembered I never got around to reviewing this bad boy trial kit I got a couple of months ago. And I seriously LOVED two of the products. Woopsie!

This is the first time I have tried Crown Pride Naturals after reading many a good thing about them over at britishcurlies.co.uk. My expectations were tempered somewhat by the fact my hair is a moody madam sometimes and hates stuff that everyone else loves. But the all natural no chemical or silicone nasties was too much for me to resist after awhile! Crown Pride's self description is as follows:

"Crown Pride Naturals is a range of handmade products designed specifically for curly hair types. We use wholesome natural, certified organic and ecocert approved ingredients, ensuring a gentle formula to soothe, nourish and replenish....

All our products are free of parabens, mineral oils, ethoxylated alcohol (PEG) and Synthetic plastics
Regardless of your hair type, that is wavy, curly or kinky, we have products to return that bouncy feeling to your curls, we know you will love it." -Crown Pride Naturals

SO that's legit "Curly Girl" method  A+ ticking all of the boxes!

I do love a trial sized package of products, because let's be honest good hair products are not cheap and if your hair doesn't love them that's more money down the drain/products left to gather dust in the product graveyard!

So I was pretty excited to try this little sampler. It contains generous travel sized bottles of:

Organic Hair Milk
Argan Smoothing Conditioner
Curl Control Styling Puree
Curl Cream Gel

Here are my impressions:

Crown Pride Organic Hair Milk: Ok so at first I wasn't sure how to use this. It is classed as a leave in conditioner, which normally with my hair would require curl cream on top of. But I found, much to my joy, that this "hair milk" is one of the best curl enhancers I have ever tried, period, and a curl cream on top is just overkill (on my 3a/3b mix hair anyway!).

I get lovely springy curls with this stuff and it's not bad at the old frizz reduction either. BIG thumbs up. It contains organic jojoba, aloe juice and marshmallow root (I don't know why but my hair does tend to like these ingredients I have noticed with other products too). It is so moisturizing, with an inoffensive, lightly sweet fragrance. I seriously need to order some more, I think because I already have two curl creams I love I felt like maybe it was overkill to own another, but tbh it's impossible to get my favourite AG:Recoil here in the U.K. so it really makes sense to have a bottle of this lovely stuff in rotation (see? I can talk myself into buying more stuff to clutter up my new bathroom no problemo!).

Crown Pride Argan Smoothing Conditioner: This is a really nice conditioner. Moisturising, not too heavy, all that jazz. But...how do I put this? I am a conditioner nut, and this one just didn't blow my socks off. I can't point out anything wrong with it, other than I am super picky and overly critical when it comes to conditioner. I felt like this didn't help tame my frizz much - often the best conditioners will give you a nice starting point and you end up with no frizz once you've added your stylers, whereas I felt this one didn't contribute to my overall hair joy!

But if your hair isn't as frizz prone as mine you might love it, and I am curious to try some of their other conditioners based on the quality of this one. *Ok so I actually just checked their website and they no longer sell this conditioner, hm! Must have been an end of line trial pack I got from British Curlies (you can purchase the line on Crown Pride's own site or British Curlies, I went with British Curlies because I usually am buying a couple of bits from other brands as well when I place an order).

Crown Pride Curl Control Styling Puree: Hmm...This is the one I still have a bit left of. SO it stands to reason it was my least favourite of the four products. I need a gel to either encourage or hold curl, or preferably do both. This puree is vaguely gel like in consistency, yellow/orange in colour (it conmtains carrot oil!) and kind of...I want to say grainy/paste like? It's kind of a weird consistency. On its own it doesn't have much hold at all in my hair, which means for it to make the cut in my X Factor style gel contest it really needs to wow on the curl formation front. Which it just doesn't, sorry. It's alright, it encourages curl a bit, but again, not enough frizz reduction to bring me to my hair happy place.

Crown Pride Curl Cream Gel: Ok So I both LOVE and am deeply perplexed by this product. It is called a "Curl Cream Gel" which in my experience is rarely a successful combo, because each perform seperate functions. BUT my hair certainly loves this stuff. I tried this in combination with the Hair Milk, and with other creams, and on its own, under gel, because this product on no planet has a gel type hold. But it makes my hair lovely and soft and virtually frizz free. It contains argan and rice brain oil but is very light and non-greasy on the hair.

It's weird magic to me because it's basically the consistency of WATER, it is so freaking runny I questioned if I had a bad batch. So it can be quite tricky to physically get it in the hair before it runs away down the bathtub. Not ideal at all. But every time I used this my hair was deeply grateful and silky (ish) so I am inclined to re-purchase this little oddity along with the Hair Milk because results are what matter! So I just had a read of Crown Pride's site and apparently they have made the formula more creamy, so I will have to test it out, see if I like it as much - I guess a lot of other people were finding it watery too! The great thing about handmade hair products I suppose, they can take customer feedback and adjust their formulas accordingly, very impressive!

So two out of four ain't bad, and I do highly recommend anyone with wavy or curly hair give Crown Pride Naturals products a try as they are made with very nice ingredients indeed and easy to get hold of online in the U.K. I would imagine this travel pack is no longer available but Crown Pride does have a new one available on their site. All in all it's a thumbs up from me for this homegrown brand, curly hair needs all the local products we can get, especially as Brexit is probably going to make imports even more expensive, ack!