QuoteReplyTopic: Hair impossible to get red PLEASE HELP Posted: April 14 2006 at 2:15pm
Hi,
Ok, my hair is porous, and I want dark red hair - like a cherry colour:
I followed people's advice and today I Colorfixed my hair to get rid of
the previous pretty nice dark brown colour out (DAMN IT!), and I was
left with very bright orange hair and light orangey brown at the
ends. I then proceeded to pre-pigment my hair with temporary red
hair colour, this was fine and my hair looked more like a burnt orange
colour. I dried the temp. colour into my hair with hairdryer on a
low heat and did several test strands with my dark red hair dye that
all turned out very desirable and rich. HOWEVER, as per usual,
when I got to dying my whole hair, I rinsed it off and was left with an
extremely weird colour. In natural light it looks dark brown
(THERE WAS NO BROWN IN THE DYE!!!?!!!), in sunlight it has bright
orange undertones that look hideous, and in dark light it looks
red/black. I honestly don't know what to do now. My hair
will inevitably be damaged more from todays shinanigans yet it looks
and feels strong and shiny........Can someone please help me get dark
red hair? This is my 2nd unsuccessful attempt, with different
methods.
It sounds like you may not have opened the cuticle enough for the red color to penetrate in to your hair. Your dark red hair dye does contain other colors... so you will end up with "brown" if the hair cuticle doesn't open enough to accept the red molecules. (Red molecules are bigger than other color molecules.) What volume developer did you use? Vol 30 has worked for me, I suspect you may have used vol 20?
Is your hair all the same color in the same light? (Or are the ends darker than the roots?) If so... Did you use a porosity treatment on the ends? Did you color the roots first and then pull the color through the ends on for the last 5-10 minutes? Typically, those methods have worked well for me.
If it's too dark - particularly "muddy" on the ends because of the porosity - you'll probably need to colorfix again. :(
If it's all one color throughout - it should be easier to rectify. Try a strand test with a higher volume developer. (If you're getting colors from a drug store and not a beauty supply store like Sally's... the developers in those kits are not going to be strong enough to open the cuticle enough to give you the red you want.)
Oh I see. Yes I always use drug store hair colours because I live
in the UK where professional products aren't available unless I buy
them off the internet - which becomes very pricey! I'll try and
get hold of some professional products...but for now I've got dark
brown hair again (the old faithful seems to be able to cover up all my
mistakes!) and I'm going to give my hair a rest for a while. I'll
have the ends trimmed soon because they're getting very dry and they
are so much more porous than the rest of my hair, and even when
Colorfixed the ends are dark and muddy...the dye won't budge there.
Porosity treatments sound like they would be ideal for my hair - I just can't buy them over here!
It's so hard to get hold of quality products when the salons in the UK
steal all the stock first and flog them on Ebay for more than they paid.
I was toying with the idea of bleaching my hair after Colorfixing (not
now, in the near future) so that my hair will soak up colour better and
be more blonde rather than muddy - what do you think?. My natural
colour is light golden blonde so I could grow it out and dye over
again but unfortunately my hair grows so slowly.
Well, it's definitely good to the ends trimmed, as you said.
The next time you decide to color, you can probably work around the
porosity problem by deep conditioning. Get a conditioner with a lot of
proteins and work it through your hair - wrap in in a warm towel and
leave it on for 30 minutes before rinising (rinse with cooler water, to
seal the moisture into your hair). I'd probably do that twice - the
day before you color and the day before that.
Actually, it wouldn't hurt to deep condition once per week, anyway!
I would stay away from the idea of bleaching just to damage your hair so it will soak up color. There are a couple of problems with that... the ends will still soak up more than the roots, so your color will not be even. Also, the color on the porous hair will look flat - it won't be shiny, etc.
If the idea is to have the bleach open your cuticle more to allow the red in, my guess is bleaching first and rinsing would close the cuticle too much to get the desired affect. I think it would only serve to put you right back where you are now, but with more damage.
Unfortunately, without access to the right coloring products I don't think you'll have much luck with getting a "permanent" red.
I think you are right which is why I'm so frustrated! Brown is so
boring....mine is dark, dull and has way to much red undertones in
it. Not to mention I get almost platinum roots every 2/3
weeks. I think I'm going to gradually let my non-bleached hair
grow out (I bleached it about 7 months ago) and keep doing my
roots brown, until my hair is in better condition, then I'll try and
get hold of some professional products...or even, if I have to, go to a
professional. I hate going to the salon and I hate the idea of
paying way too much for something I don't want (they never get it
right).
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