How Dreadlocks Work - People | HowStuffWorks

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Bob Marley's sons
Some of Bob Marley's children, showing a variety of locks, pose for a photo in 2004. (L-R): Kymani, Julian, Ziggy, Damian and Stephen Marley. Frank Micelotta/Getty Images

To understand how a head full hair develops into a head full of dreadlocks, you first need to understand what a single lock looks like at its basic level. At the root of the dreadlock phenomenon is the idea that when hair is left alone, over time it will tangle and separate into sections. Essentially, dreadlocks are individual masses of knots that the wearer encourages to continue growing into a coil that eventually resembles a piece of rope or yarn. Up close, a dreadlock looks similar to steel wool — fibers woven together so thoroughly that they form one solid mass.

Picture a very tightly knit rug. If you look closely, what you see is hundreds of filaments of thread woven together. If you followed one single thread, you would see that it moves in and out from between the other threads over and over. Since each thread is locked into place by the pattern of the knitting, the rug itself looks more like a single mass of fabric than a collection of many threads.

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A dreadlock is very similar, with the exception that the individual "threads" of hair are not woven together in any set pattern. They are random. In fact, some hairstylists actually offer immediate, temporary dreadlocks they create by knotting the hair quickly with a crochet hook or interlocking tool.

Once a dreadlock is formed and the individual locks grow, new hair will continue to grow and lock.

Read on to find out how dreadlocks form in different types of hair.

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