My morning routine has remained relatively unchanged for the better part of a decade. There may be more actives in my skincare and premium products in my make-up bag but anything too novel, requiring effort in exchange for a marginally more presentable appearance, has never stayed the course.

On days I cleanse and style my hair, I use my hairdryer almost immediately to coerce my natural texture, which consists of unruly waves around my crown and raging ringlets underneath, into plaines before passing straighteners through it in an attempt to tame the frizz. At the front, it’s passable. At the back, my roots repel from my scalp in all directions. For formal occasions I’ve reached for the curling wand, or heated rollers for volume, often rendering results that either damage my hair or fail to hold their shape. But when my editor-in-chief stood in my driveway ahead of the Easter break offering up a trip to the warm shores of Noosa in Queensland, Australia to trial the new Shark® SmoothStyle™ Heated Comb Straightener + Smoother tool, I was in no position to decline.

So off I went, trading the autumn chill for sunshine, apprehensive about said tool’s efficacy. Not only was it a scorching 27 degrees with zero cloud cover but it was also more than 75 percent humidity — conditions that are typically detrimental to the staying power of any hairstyle. Trading flyaways and frizz for voluminous roots and billowy bounce, I learned from Sydney salon owner Christopher Hunter and Shark Beauty ambassador how to use the new SmoothStyle tool to create hairstyles to inspire my daily routine and even how to style the occasional updo.

My hair objective has always been to look effortless, inoffensive, and, if I’m lucky, freshly blown out.

And I can safely affirm, several weeks later, that I have not used my hairdryer or straightener once since being in possession of the SmoothStyle. I can blow dry my damp hair on the Wet Hair Mode setting, and use the ceramic coated plates on the Dry Hair Mode setting to reset second-day hair. Though I have experimented with section sizes — or no sectioning at all — the SmoothStyle has consistently delivered the same results in a fraction of the time. In fact, it favours the resistance of my large lazily gathered ‘sections’. This, I later learned, is due to the effective combination of nylon and boar bristles, which grab and smooth the hair whilst producing shine.

My stubborn medium-length hair can go from semi-wet to soft and bouncy in less than 14 minutes. It gives my ends definition and a thickness that resembles Cher from ’90s classic Clueless, and has given me a newfound confidence as I swan out the door. When direct messages find me on social media and ask, ‘Is it worth the hype?’ My reply is: ‘For hair like mine? Absolutely.’