The silk pillowcase I finally bought

I had resisted silk pillowcases for two years. The reasons were ordinary: the cost, the skepticism, the suspicion that I was being marketed to by a beauty industry that has, historically, been very willing to sell me things I did not need. The pillowcases were thirty-five euros each. The cotton ones I had been using were four.

Last September I bought one anyway. A small twenty-two-momme mulberry silk pillowcase in a soft champagne colour from a small French brand. I have been sleeping on it most nights for eight months.

What changed for the hair

More than I expected. My hair, which had been knotting at the back overnight for years, stopped knotting within the first week. The morning brushing, which had been a small daily wrestle, became a thirty-second straight glide. The hair was visibly less broken at the ends after about a month.

I am not a hair-care expert. I do not know exactly what is happening at the level of the cuticle. What I know is that the friction between hair and cotton, multiplied over seven or eight hours of sleep, was doing a small steady damage that I had not registered as damage, and that removing the friction has, in eight months, produced a measurable improvement in how my hair looks and behaves.

What did not change for the skin

Most things I had been promised. The silk did not, in any visible way, reduce the fine lines on the side of my face that I sleep on. The skin did not look more rested in the morning. The pillowcase made no difference to my skincare routine that I could detect.

On the maintenance

Silk pillowcases require slightly more care than cotton. I wash mine in a small mesh bag, in cold water, with a gentle detergent, and hang it to dry. The wash adds maybe two minutes to a laundry day. The pillowcase has held its colour and texture through about thirty washes.

I have, since then, bought two more. The original is sometimes in the wash and the spares mean the bed always has one. The cost has been worth it for the hair alone. The skin claim is, I think, mostly marketing — but the hair claim turned out to be real, and the hair was the part of me that needed the help.