Hair Colour FAQ — Everything You Need to Know Before Colouring Your Hair

Hair Colour FAQ - Everything You Need to Know Before Colouring Your Hair - Blog

There’s nothing quite like the great feeling of walking out of the salon after a full cut and colour. It’s amazing how a new shade can impact your style. Just take a look at any red carpet Instagram post!
 
A quick hair gloss can add brilliance and shine to dull strands, while permanent hair colour will effectively conceal any trace of grey hair. Want to illuminate your hair dramatically? Lightening to a hot platinum blonde will do the trick immediately! Although, depending on your original hair colour, this process might take more than one appointment. Please talk to your colourist to discuss all the options.
 
However, achieving and maintaining a beautiful new hair colour goes way beyond picking a shade. But lucky for you, we got all the tips you need to feel confident when speaking to your colourist in the salon!
 
Permanent Versus Demi-Permanent
 
Depending on your needs and how much time you’re willing to put into upkeep and maintenance, there are pros and cons to using both permanent and semi-permanent hair colours.
 
Permanent hair colour involves the process of mixing an oxidizer (often hydrogen peroxide) and ammonia before applying it on the hair, so that the formula opens the cuticle and penetrates the hair shaft, where the colour will stay. Basically, the colour stays intact until the hair grows. Or you decide to change it!
 
Professional hair colour, when applied correctly by an expert colourist in the salon, will not damage your hair. In fact, the formulas have drastically evolved to colour and treat hair simultaneously thanks to a healthy cocktail of high-performance ingredients geared to moisturise and strengthen hair.
 
Demi-permanent hair colour contains no ammonia, but just enough peroxide to open up the hair cuticle so that the correct amount of colour will penetrate the surface of the hair and deposit the colour. It usually lasts up to 24 shampoos and is a great hair option for enhancing your natural colour, blending greys, toning highlights or for colour correction. Your colourist will help guide you during the consultation, prior to applying the colour.
 
Because of concerns about irritation and sometimes strong odours, many brands now offer ammonia-free hair colour. These products replace it with a combination of other chemical compound and emollient oils, which function as a pH adjuster. Ammonia-free hair colour is less harsh and preserves hair’s integrity and health.

Is it safe?
 
As long as you don’t have any allergies to any of the active ingredients in hair colour (mainly PPD), colouring your hair is a perfectly safe practice.
 
To strengthen hair and increase shine, weekly at home moisture treatments (think hair masks and leave-in conditioners) are a great idea before, after, and in-between salon visits. Finally, using sulfate-free shampoos and conditioners, avoiding excess heat from hot styling tools, and using hair sunscreen will greatly increase the longevity of your beautiful hair colour.
 
How often should you dye your hair?
 
The frequency in which you’ll need to colour your hair depends on how fast your hair grows (and the roots start showing), or how soon you want to start experimenting with another, new colour! Permanent colour is formulated to last, and can be well preserved with the correct routine and monthly root touch-ups. Demi-permanents only coat the exterior hair shaft and fade progressively over the course of six weeks, which is a good option if you don’t want to commit to one single colour.
 
Colour appointments can last anywhere between thirty minutes (for a quick gloss to add superb brilliance and shine) to over two hours if you’re going for a fabulous double process blonde (lightening first, and then adding a toner) or a balayage. Your Pure hair colour expert will help you choose the best type of hair colour for you, depending on the look you’re going for, as well as your expectations regarding time, cost, maintenance, and upkeep.
 
Happy hair colouring!

Hair Colour FAQ — Everything You Need to Know Before Colouring Your Hair