@cicion My husband and I own a Lagotto and after learning to groom (because of ours) we now groom multiple other lagottos regularly. We could almost open our own shop doing just Lagottos now
We haven't groomed any other curly haired breeds, but from my understanding one of the biggest differences with Lagotto's is that you never blow-out-straighten the curls like I think you do with poodles. The goal is not to break the curls because once they are broken the hair starts to mat. You also don't brush the coat when it is dry and you don't use conditioner. I tested a conditioner once in 1 spot on my Lagotto (because I didn't believe it could be as bad as they say) and only that one spot got frizzy, staticy and pouffy and did not curl anymore until it got shaved.
Depending on the dog we say 6-10 weeks per shave, and very few of them brush their dog more then once between grooms.
This is our process:
Dog arrives, plays with ours for a bit and then on the table. Ear pluck first, then a rough shave with #3 or #4 everywhere except for the head which is scissored roughly. Ears to the leather on the tip and then all along the back of the ear but leave the front part of the ear to blend in with the facial hair. Blend from the shorter back of the ear to meet the longer front of ear. Shave out the hair between paw pads and clean up between toes (watching the water-dog skin that connects the toes). #10 on the privates, scissor bum clean. The tail should be slightly thicker at the base then it is at the tip (carrot shaped).
Then bathe with just shampoo, no conditioner. Then force-dry to remove most of the water and check the skin for any redness, irritation or rashes. These dogs have quite thin skin so force drying is great for doing a check in on skin health. But while force drying do not brush to straighten the curls, just remove the majority of the moisture so you can finish.
After force drying, return the not-quite dry dog to the table and comb the head hair out. Don't use those metal spikey brushes, they will break the coat and cause it to mat easier next time. We then blow dry the dog on low heat with a hand held blow dryer (but I am sure you guys have better dryers or cage dryers). Then we use a #3F or 4F and do the finish on the body. Scissor finish the face shape, leaving a bit of the stop so that the eyes and nose don't look completely separated. From the side view the transition from the top of the head to the nose looks kind of like a ski slope. Trim the "drip zone" from the mouth, check the teeth health and examine for any cracked teeth and then clean the ears. We do the nails last and there's nothing different about Lagotto nails.
I realize that rough shaving before bathing is usually a no no in the grooming world, but after the bath any hair that we missed on the rough cut sort of sticks up better and gets clipped easily with the finishing blades. We haven't found a better way yet, this just seems to work so well for us.
It takes roughly 2.5 to 3 hours per trim for us but again, all we do is Lagottos! Some of what I have detailed here might be common knowledge to you guys as groomers but I hope that detailing out our method might have helped somehow.
(vet groomer)