If you try one product this week, make it a hair styling cream that lets you ditch the dryer

This week's Sunday Service goes out to my fellow air-dryers - this style defining buy is truly life-enhancing

a blue frame with clouds on it containing a circular image of a hand holding JVN Complete air dry cream and another circular image of beauty editor Fiona McKim with wavy hair
(Image credit: Future / Fiona McKim)

Before I was one, I assumed that all beauty editors were perfectly groomed 24/7. Monthly manicures, a daily face of makeup, trims every six weeks (a recommendation I approach with the same flexibility as our government-mandated wine allowance)

With age, wisdom and over a decade in the industry, I've realised there are many ways to be a beauty journalist, and preened glamourpuss is but one. Thank goodness, because, intensive skincare routine aside, I'm actually a fairly low-maintenance person.

My specialist subject - and professional raison d'être - is finding products that sit within the Venn diagram overlap of low effort and high reward. And when I say JVN Complete Air Dry Cream is right in that sweet spot, I'm talking full bullseye.

Why this smoothing and style-holding cream is my beauty buy of the week

This laissez-faire approach is especially true of my hair, which I air dry probably five days a week. I love heat-styled beach waves as much as the next Sienna Miller-worshipping millennial. However, I also have a demanding job, a toddler, a dog, an old therefore slightly crumbly flat and an active social life that I stubbornly insist on maintaining despite all of the above.

That's a long way of saying I'm quite busy. And wet hair, left to its own devices, will do the work itself. If I could leave my face alone and makeup would appear, slightly less nicely than if I'd done it, I'd take that option most of the time, too. Especially, if the cosmetic equivalent of this air dry cream existed.

Two rectangular images, one of beauty editor Fiona McKim with wavy hair and another of her hand holding JVN Complete air dry cream

(Image credit: Future / Fiona McKim)

Even if you're dedicated to your best hair dryer, it's a no-brainer to take a break from heat styling now and then - and this product would make it a pleasure to do so, irrespective of hair type.

Funnily enough, my fine, straight strands are quite far down the list of hair types this product should be best for. Styling creams usually gel with thick and naturally-textured hair, and a curly-haired pal has confirmed this defines and defrizzes like a dream.

You don't need me to tell you how great this would be on holiday instead of sweating under a gasping hotel dryer. The brand offers a cute 60ml tube that's begging to travel with you this summer and rings in at a very affordable £12. Sound good? Great! Let's chat next Sunday.

Fiona McKim
Beauty Editor, womanandhome.com

As woman&home's Beauty Channel Editor, Fiona Mckim loves to share her 15+ years of industry intel on womanandhome.com and Instagram (@fionamckim if you like hair experiments and cute shih-tzus). After interning at ELLE, Fiona joined woman&home as Assistant Beauty Editor in 2013 under industry legend Jo GB, who taught her to understand ingredients and take a cynical approach to marketing claims. She has since covered every corner of the industry, interviewing dermatologists and celebrities from Davina McCall to Dame Joan Collins, reporting backstage at London Fashion Week and judging the w&h Beauty Awards.