The Hair Update No One Asked For!

I’ve been trying to get a little more consistent in blogging lately, which includes posting every other Sunday. Now, I was planning on sharing my thoughts on the OITNB finale, but I sense that this subject might take me a while to get enveloped in, and time has gotten a way a bit, so instead let’s talk about something a little more basic… the hair. I’ll get to OITNB another time (lots to say!).

Since the post I wrote regarding the ‘history of my hair’, I have since changed it up slightly and wanted to share the thought process for anyone who’s interested. For those who didn’t read it or who haven’t seen me around the past few months, we left it at this sort of stage:

This was fine for a long time, I just needed to touch up the ends with Live XXL Ultra Brights and maybe tint the roots if I got bored. However, between washes, the ends faded to a sort of brick colour. After a gentle bleaching to bring the pink portion higher one day, it took really well and I was left with very blonde ends, which made me wonder about the possibilities of changing things up and going brighter for the summer. My sister and I debated our next project for my hair, and we finally settled on an idea we thought doable. After purchasing some clips, foil, tinting brushes and several tubs of Directions la riche, we started things off with a good bleaching.

Above you can see the process from starting colour to post-bleach results (you’ll also see my sister who helped me get the look). It looked okay as is but it was very streaky and obviously still wouldn’t take too much up top on account of a recent permanent auburn shade I coloured my roots with. We used our go-to Garnier Nutrisse lightener for this bleaching, as they’re good at stripping colour but not too harsh on your hair. I kept it like this for a couple of days as I quite like having blonde hair, but as it was so patchy up top, we soon returned to the plan.

We mixed a bunch of Directions shades to get the hues above (ignore the foot) which my sis very thoroughly and carefully bled into each other on sections of my hair; creating an ombré that slightly resembled the cocktail, ‘Sex on the Beach’. Unfortunately the upper shades ran into the yellow when rinsing out, so you’ll notice the ends don’t change much, despite her stellar efforts in dyeing. I still loved the results though!

The only issue here was that Directions brighter colours don’t always last as long as Ultra Brights, and though I liked the colour it washed out to (above), it would show how patchy the roots were whenever the bright coral kind of colours would fade. After living with it for a while, I decided to risk just one more bleaching, see if I could fix the top half. For most part, this worked nicely. I ended up very blonde, mostly happy and ready for colours- however, certain areas still just wouldn’t take! Bleach can’t seem to break through it all. It was back to patchy… and I tried to even things slightly and get some vibrance by finishing off the yellow Directions I had left, all over. For photography purposes and for under hats, it was fine, and it was different, but after a while I had a rethink.

I figured, if I were to blend from top to bottom some of my trusty Live Ultra Brights pink, it could go one of two ways: It could mix with the yellow to create that colour we achieved beforehand, only lasting longer this time, or I’d end up with pink and yellow hair. Either way, I gave it a go! Suffice to say, the results were pretty good, thankfully. I’ve kept it this way ever since, just adding a touch of the fluorescent Directions to the ends for vibrance, and a little diluted pink ultra brights up top when it wears out, and so far, I’m not bored of it. When I am, I may go full pink again for ease, because I currently coat-condition my ends before shampooing to avoid colour runs, which can be a nuisance/wasteful.

I do expect to neutralise things soon otherwise, but for summer, for fun, I’m liking my (as it’s now been named) rocket lolly hair. I conserve colour as much as I can by not washing too often (hats for greasy days!), very dilute dye rinses on occasion, conditioning ends but not shampooing, and the occasional use of dry shampoo. That’s not to say it doesn’t fade quite fast, but its manageable and still interesting when its faded slightly.

Oh yeah, the yellow has a bit of a day glow and UV glow to it too. Nothing boring about that!