STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

sophie · Kenneth Cole

Dying natural color hair

Hermione · Kate Spade

anything that lifts your haircolor will have some bleach in it -

do you have a regular stylist or know someone that has a good one? just go in for a consultation (should be free) and discuss how highlights would affect your hair and what the best option would be.

erin · Chanel

if you have dark brown hair (virgin), and the stylist is suggesting a bleach and tone, immediately go to someone else! i only do that on someone that wants to get REALLY blonde, or already has color in their hair.

without bleach, you will not be able to get super light, but you can get light enough highlights without having *too much* brass. (by nature, you will still see a little bit of brassyness, but you can use a violet based shampoo to cancel this out)

he/she should be able to use an ashy color to lift your hair and make it look nice and natural.. the most lift you will be able to see is probably 4-5 levels lighter...(which is still a big difference)

blink · Coach

Well, with naturally dark pigmented hair, the bleach and toner method might be neccessary because without bleach, your hair really won't lift and without toner, it will very likely look brassy. Also, with virgin hair, it really shouldn't end up too stripped through just one application of the highlighting bleach. And your touch-ups will usually only be done on the root-to-first-inches, and will leave alone the already highlighted ends of your hair.

erin · Chanel

lorelei wrote:

Well, with naturally dark pigmented hair, the bleach and toner method might be neccessary because without bleach, your hair really won't lift and without toner, it will very likely look brassy. Also, with virgin hair, it really shouldn't end up too stripped through just one application of the highlighting bleach. And your touch-ups will usually only be done on the root-to-first-inches, and will leave alone the already highlighted ends of your hair.

well, you won't get super light highlights without bleach but it can definitely lift a lot lighter!

without bleach, you can lift hair about 4-5 levels. for example, my natural haircolor looks like this:

but i could get highlights about this level without bleach.

and honestly, anything lighter than that would be pretty tacky without a base break! (lifting all of the hair, and adding highllights on top)

a good colorist can get that shade without brass by using an ashy shade, and by using color additives to the dye. (ie, when i color someone with dark hair, i add a ton of blue to the mixture so that i can cancel out the orange, which is what you usually see at that level)