We all fall in love with lighter hair color at one point.
My love affair with light brown hair with red and gold highlights lasted 12 years. But at some point we get tired of monthly maintenance and wish for a color closer to our original so roots would not be so blatant. Letting it grow out on its own just looks untidy, especially when the roots get bigger.
To dye the whole thing to the original black-brown may be too abrupt for some. To ease your way gradually as you go back to dark, or just darker, here are some options. You may opt to have these done professionally or if you are confident enough, buy a do-it-yourself coloring kit and tackle this at home.
1. Lowlights—Highlighting caps and a crochet needle for fishing out the hair can be bought in any beauty supply store like HBC or the beauty department of department stores.
How thick you want the strands to be retouched is up to you. Choose a dark or medium brown shade whichever is closest to your original strands and apply color in the parts where the dyed area starts till the tips.
Never pick black as hardly anybody’s hair is that dark in reality. This will result in a more subtle color discrepancy so it will seem like your lighter strands at the bottom half are remnants of a summer beach trip that is now fading.
2. Let the back of your hair grow out or have it colored back to its original shade, but maintain the highlights (not solid blocks of color) on those chunks of hair that frame your face.
You may be attached to the lighter color because it flatters your skin tone more and requires less make-up. If you decide to grow out the highlights framing your face, it will be a subtle painless process without blatant color boundaries.
If the color you choose to frame your face is three shades or more lighter than your natural please, have a professional do it. Tried straight bleach on my hair once and it broke off in clumps.
Fact: Nobody’s hair is one solid color. If you look closely, natural blondes have reds and browns woven in. redheads have golds, yellows and brown, brunettes have reds, browns, black and even gold.
Dying it one solid block of color gives the effect of an unnatural wig. Solid blocks of color only work with people who have about 30-70 percent white hair as the different shades will give the effects of natural highlights. Predominantly white hair gets the wig effect as well.
Do-it-yourself kits
For permanent hair color, try Lolane Hair Color available in Cash and Carry and Shopwise. It even has hair conditioning oils for those with dry dull frizzy hair.
Other brands: Garnier, Revlon and L’Oreal hair dyes.
Want a highlighted effect but are too lazy to use a cap? L’Oreal Feria adds dimension to hair color as the strands won’t all be uniform in shade.
Are you fickle and change color every month or according to fashion trends? Provided you do not have white hair, opt for a semipermanent peroxide free rinses that wash off gradually every time you shampoo.
The color change won’t be as dramatic but at least you do not damage your hair with frequent coloring. You can manipulate the shade, too, by the undertone you choose. Blonde tones will make your dark hair a deep golden brown while reds will register as deep auburn chestnut or mahogany.
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