5 Badass ‘Dos For Wet Hair — & They’re Easy, Too!

There's "beach hair" — artfully disheveled waves with lots of intentional texture — and then there's your hair when you're actually at the beach: soaking wet, thick with salt, a little too sandy to feel good, and sticking to your sunscreen. It's an unromantic reality made harsher when we spot those over-stylized looks we wish were beach hair.

But, just because you're oceanside without access to your styling tools doesn't mean your beauty game has to suffer. In fact, that naturally gritty texture created by salt water is the perfect base to hold totally gorgeous, effortlessly chic hairstyles in place. Just remember to throw a couple of elastics and a bobby pin or two into your beach bag, and you're set for the day.

To help us come up with five beach-day-perfect looks, we called in hairstylist Clay Nielsen. Nielsen's work tends to feature the kind of messy, frizzy texture that occurs naturally when we're playing in the sand, so we knew he'd be the perfect pro for the job. Click through for the tutorial, shot on location at New York City's famous Rockaway Beach.