The Blonde Hair Thread #2

[lafindesiecle]

Fleur have you tried washing your hair a few times to rinse out any excess dye? Sometimes it just takes a few rinses and a day or two for a weird tone to even out.... otherwise maybe it's time to call a stylist

My hair (I had to get it stripped, bleached, and dyed and the girl couldn't get it as light as I wanted so dyed this darker ash colour over it in an attempt to fix it) had this really gruesome flat greenish tone to it at first and after a week or two of shampooing it lightened maybe half a level and warmed up to a golden blonde nicely! I think there was just a lot of residual dye on it which was making it so icky.

 

[Alvedansen]

it could also be caused by the wrong shampoo or other hairproducts, check if it says something on the packaging. i once had a bit of a green tint and my hairdresser said i should wash (or rinse?) it with water with an aspirin plus c tablet (dissolved in the water). i'm sure if you google it you will find some other home remedies. (i never tried it, so i can't say whether it really works)

 

[dauphine]

If you can stand to wait until after vacation to do something about it, I would suggest that. You're going to see a lot of salt and sun, don't mess with it any more than you absolutely must. It will definitely fade. Maybe try using clarifying shampoo for a few days? Prell is great.

 

[FleurDeLys]

Thanks girls!
it has already faded a little after the first wash, my hair never holds colour well. It's less dark now but still greyish. I think I'll try the aspirin-method, or maybe wash my hair with some lemon juice?
I hope my hair will be back to normal before I go on holiday!

 

[lafindesiecle]

^^ one of the main ingredients in aspirin is Salicylic Acid which comes from tea tree oil, so maybe tea tree soap/shampoo has similar effects too? i have no idea though, but seems like it might make sense!

FYI I've only heard the aspirin for blonde hair that's gone green from chlorine though, not from a dyeing accident! So I'm not sure if it's a chemical reaction exclusively with chlorine or if it helps to purify/clean out hair in general?

 

[diesanni]

I have a problem. My hair was really blonde for summer (balayage) but now I wanted to return to my natural hair colour which is a neutral blonde. Not too ash, not too honey either. I mixed two colours (8 & 8/13 with volume 20) and left in on for 30min. Now my hair is slightly too dark and has a horrible greyish/green tint to it.
HOW do I fix this?
Would a honey-ish colour cancel out the green tone and make it more natural?
Also, I'm going on a holiday to Egypt in two weeks and my hair will see a lot of sun and salty water .

Don't dye it again, you'll only make it worse. When your hair turns this nasty greenish grey color after you dyed it, it is more likely than not that it was too damaged, dry or brittle to adopt any color in the first place. The pigments in your hair adopt color pigments from dye but every time you lighten it, more and more pigments are removed. It not only weakens your hair's structure, it also reduces it's ability to absorb color pigments from dye diversely and you end up with a weird greyish shade instead. Just like when you mix random colors, you always end up with brown.

Try a shampoo for grey hair. The ones that have a deep purple tint to it. They help a lot with neutralizing those nasty undertones but they are also rather drying so you should make sure your hair gets a lot of moisture. Try massaging a bit of warmed up olive oil in and leave it in overnight or even better, some coconut-oil. A more gentle solution than Aspirin is camomile. Boil up a highly concentrated solution with dried blossoms (let it boil and then simmer for about two hours, pour it a bottle and store in the fridge) and spray your hair with it after every wash.

When you're in the sun a lot and your hair is wet most of the time anyway get some shea butter. It's greasy but it's very moisturizing and offers natural sun protection.

 

[dauphine]

^
I love to massage coconut oil in to my hair. I try to leave it in as long as possible - 48 hours + if I am really not leaving the house at all. It's great for neutralizing the oxidation/damage that comes with chemical processes. Also hot oil treatments will help lift some of the green/gray pigment.

 

[lafindesiecle]

Re: coconut oil, Organix makes this amazing coconut oil serum that I use pretty much daily which I swear took my hair back to normal really fast after I lightened it the first time, highly recc'd! Really helps with reducing breakage and getting things smooth again.

 

[dauphine]

Coconut oil is the best thing ever for my hair. Really. I also love it on dry cuticles. And it's a good organic makeup remover.

 

[pengy]

Thx for the coconut oil tips, I so have to try that!
I am currently using some L'Oréal oil fluid on my lightly damaged tops. It's ok but I am not totally convinced with it... Any recommendation for a certain coco oil (Europe pls?)?

This coconut oil shampoo is really awesome! Super gentle to hair & scalp and very nurturing. Plus it smells like vacation (...God I need sun and warmth!!)

breeze-of-beauty.blogspot.com

 

[lafindesiecle]

Has anyone ever tried to lift their hair a shade using a really mild bleach bath? I've used it on other people's already-platinum hair to brighten it with a lot of success and pretty even colour with no damage, but I want to bring my now-level-7.5 or so hair up another level, maybe gradually, because I seriously can't afford to go to a salon right now. I can obviously wait until things look up a little in a month or so, but ugh! haha.

I was thinking of mixing a little bit of powder with 20 or 30 vol and my shimmerlights shampoo, combing it through and letting it sit maybe 20 minutes max... I did a strand test on a strip behind my ear and it came out great and evenly a level lighter, but I'm nervous about doing my whole head!

 

[dauphine]

I used to do that all the time. It usually came out OK. Eventually I started just putting 40 volume bleach on without powder, since it's high peroxide but no ammonia.

 

[lafindesiecle]

Dauphine, does that help and what do the results look like? Were you using 40vol dev or was it actually some sort of bleach mixture?

Would, say, mixing 40 vol dev with some of my shimmerlights conditioner lighten my hair a bit? Does it tend to get brassy? I've heard of people doing that to strip henna out of their hair but wasn't aware that it could lighten hair alone as well.

 

[dauphine]

I don't think that it got any more brassy than actually mixing it with bleach powder. I never added shampoo, I probably sometimes mixed it with conditioner, but not much. That would just water it down. Shampoo etc won't do anything to help activate it.

 

[lafindesiecle]

Yah, I was going to mix it with the shimmerlights both to dilute it a bit and to tone it at the same time. Might experiment with it tonight, we'll see! aah!

 

[dauphine]

Good luck!

 

[lafindesiecle]

WELP it ended up a little tawnier than I was hoping, but definitely lightened about two shades, and pretty evenly too! My hair also still feels super soft and NOT damaged at ALL. I mixed 1 scoop of Quickblue with about 60 mL of 30 vol toner and mixed that up and then mixed in about an equal amount of my conditioner, applied on the ends first, let sit 15 minutes, then combed through and did closer to my roots as well.

I should've bought some toner first -- I'm a little embarassed cuz I'm definitely at work and looking way brassy -- but overall I'm pretty pleased since it could've been a major disaster and it's definitely not "you screwed up your hair orange" as much as "eh, tone it and it'll look fine, at least it's even" apricot-blonde. I'm gonna try toning with my blue shampoo again tonight and if that doesn't work, I might either a.) try it again to see if lightening it a little bit more pulls out some of the orange, or 2.) just get another toner or a light ash blonde dye to dye over it in a few days.

 

[lafindesiecle]

here's the before and after from the bleach bath... see, not too bad, a little brassy but i think i can definitely get that under control with some toner pretty quickly. yay!

 

[FleurDeLys]

The nasty greenish/greyish tint in my hair is gone just by washing it with purple shampoo. I only used this shampoo when I wanted to make my blonde hair less yellow but when Diesanni suggested it I gave it a try. Thanks! I didn't know it would help with the green :-D.
After two washes with regular shampoo the dye was almost completely gone and after a few purple shampoo washes it's completely back to normal again. It seems that my hair was indeed too brittle to hold any colour. I'm afraid I'll have to let it grow out entirely...
Thank you all for your suggestions !

lafindesiecle: My hair was like that too when I switched from a light brown to blonde earlier this year and purple shampoo helped a lot with the yellowness! It might take some washes though.

 

[lafindesiecle]

@fleur glad to hear you got the green out! good luck with the rest of your colour adventures...

i think i'm going to go home and sit with purple shampoo/conditioner on my head for 15 minutes tonight and see how it turns out... fingers crossed that it helps! i suspect it should as it's not TERRIBLE, just a little too... apricot. does anyone have any other recc's for toning it down at home? i was thinking of getting one of the wella light ash blondes.