fine curly hair: battle of length vs density

[goldenoak]

Hello!

(I'm new here, and have been browsing around the forums looking for a conversation about this, but I haven't been able to find it. I apologize if it's a duplicate.)

I have 3b i/ii curly fine hair. It's been down to TBL in the past, but when it's that long and all one length only the ends are curly, because the hair closer to the scalp is weighted down by the length of it. In order to have hair closer to my crown stay curly, it needs to be layered to some degree so that the hair on top is lightweight enough to curl.

Here's where my question comes in. I have pretty fine hair, so don't have an infinite volume to play with when it comes to layering. When it was long, I tried layering it, but while the top looked great, the bottom ended up looking scraggly. (Not fairytale ends, even, just... scraggle. Like a mistake.)

Is there anyone out there who's found themselves in this pickle? I fear that BSL may be the longest that my hair volume can support while being able to wear it down-and-all-curly. Are there any tricks I haven't thought of?

Thanks in advance for any feedback! :)

[spidermom]

Well, there are layers and then there are layers. I've had very light surface layering done in the past to break up what looked like a pyramid at shoulder-length. Of course, this isn't your problem, but I think it should be possible to do a very light layering that wouldn't cut into your overall density too much.