Gnat says:

Yup, I did the ol' heat shrink method.
Basically, just braided my hair to *just* under the thickness of the tube. Put beeswax over the braid to keep it smooth, then dipped my fingers in hairspray and ran over the braid. That made the plait very stiff and I didn't need string to pull it through the tube. Just slip on.
Then zap with hairdryer until scalp hurt. :)"

It took her 3 hours to do the braiding, and 9 hours to add the tubing. You can see some more pics of this here.

Gnat continues:
"Well, after $125 for the 2 hours of braids and $40 for 60 feet of tubing that took 9 hours to put in? Well, yes, it worked great, but the tubes were constantly slipping out. Maybe because my hair was too short, or maybe because the tube wasn't shrunk enough, or whatever.

Anyway, I pulled all of it out after about three weeks in frustration when the tubes were falling out faster than I could put back in.

More frustation set in when I couldn't seem to find more vibrant tubing colors. Heat shrink was limited to the "industrial" colors, and I was after really bright stuff.

Poking around some leads on the web, I finally came across Wildfire-affiliate based in Canada that was selling UV reactive tubing by the foot from their webpage. With the exchange rates being what they are, plus tax, duty, and shipping, I was looking at 60 cents per foot. I placed an order, and they mailed me back with, "Oh, we're out of stock."

Then I found more Wildfire tubing in Australia. About the same price. Emailed them. They also returned, "Hey, we're outta stock! But try the American-side, as I think they still have some left!"

Wildfire HQ in Los Angeles [1] no longer had the tubing on their website. Out of sheer madness, I just called them from work and begged. Turns out that Wildfire has decided to discontinue the UV-reactive tubes, as they weren't selling it well, it was having problems with consistency from the manufacturers, etc. I had to agree with them, as when I looked into getting custom colored tubing from a place myself, they were at least kind enough to inform me that they had a 30,000 foot minimum order. *cough*

But, they had a limited spectrum of colors still left. No pink, but I finally ended up with 200 feet of "Vibrant red", 150 feet of "opaque invisible blue" (white that glows blue under blacklight), and 150 of the "deep violet", all in 2mm diameter, at about 50 cents a foot. They were *extremely* prompt at shipping this stuff out to me, and I squeeled like a perky schoolgirl when I opened the box! This stuff is vibrant! Yay!

Next step. Putting it in. I still can't conceptualize how Pepe's does it, but I figured out a way. I stopped in at my local ethnic hair salon and confused the poor woman enough until her face lit up with understanding. She charged me for an "interlock weave", I had to run down to the local hair-supply store for a package of pink jumbo braid, and then we got started.

Knowing that my (caucasian, dyed-to-hell, slippery) hair would never hold a cornrow for long, my stylist used the jumbo braid along with my own hair to create one giant cornrow that spiraled from my bangs (still loose) up to my crown. Then, taking the tubing, she "sewed" the tube underneath the braid next to the scalp, pulled through, and knotted once. This was a fairly long process, also hampered by the other appointments that had to be taken care of throughout the day, but after 5 hours of flipping through articles on Janet Jackson's and Lil' Kim's various looks, I had plenty for inspiration! :)

The top shot I'm most impressed with. Can't see my own hair, nor my scalp! These being the major complaints I had with the heat-shrink method. But then you figure 60 pieces to about 120 feet compared to probably around 200 pieces folded in half... BIG difference in thickness.

My head now hurts like I haven't felt since I got my waist-length ghetto-braid dreads, but this should loosen up after a few days. Well, okay, it'd BETTER.

Cost: Tubes were 50 cents per foot. So total cost for tubing, about $200.
The weave was $150.
Stylist: LaTonia Grice-Harold Jazzy Salon & Boutique 1552 Fillmore St San Francisco, CA 94115 1-415-928-1198

[1] Wildfire Inc 5200 W. 83rd St Los Angeles, CA 90045 Ph: 310-645-7787 Fax: 310-645-9009

website: http://www.wildfirefx.com/
http://www.eurotekmarketing.com/plastic/flex.jpg has a good picture of the actual colors under blacklight. Ed's note: *There's also a pretty stunning example of how Gnat's tubes look here!

Everybody order as much as you can, and maybe it'll convince them to bring the line back into full scale!"