Hues That Girl? Hair Color Removal 101

Whoops, now what?

The minute you figure out your hair color is not what you want, or is a complete mistake . . . the very first thing you should do? Walk into your bathroom, find the crappiest shampoo you can. Shampoo your hair and leave the shampoo in the hair for a couple hours. What we are looking for when we need to correct the wrong hair color is to begin loosening the hair color molecules that are trapped in the hair strand. As silly and simple as it sounds, one of the most common and gentle methods of fading artificial hair color is the “shampoo”. It is the number one method that fades color from color to re-coloring. Therefore it only makes sense to use it. In hair color as in life, common sense can be your best friend.

The title of the procedure? the Shampoo Train. Why? Because it involves application after application of shampoo, while waiting for your color remover to arrive and for you to do the research needed to fix your hair color. One of the most alarming realizations I came to in listening to the women of America talk about the problems they have with getting the proper hair color ? Was not that they couldn’t afford to go to a competent hair colorist, it was that they could not “FIND ONE”! !! !! What a horrible thing to hear….Wow that was a wake-up call. You will find if you read this Blog from the beginning until now, that I had completely different ideas at the beginning. I had absolutely no intentions of teaching America how to formulate their own hair color, it is hard enough to teach certified Hair Stylists how to. When I found that to be the biggest problem I changed game plans … I truly wanted to “give-back” and I felt by teaching what I knew about hair color and hair health it would probably be the most appreciated advice I could give. That’s what happens when you fall ill ( you become reflective!)

As simple as shampooing sounds it is always what I have recommended to anyone stopping by, or calling me in a panic about their hair color. I prefer you order and use our SOMA Shampoo with for that process, but if speed & panic is in the equation - - use Prell! Using the most gentle manner to fade unwanted color out of the hair is always the best decision so grab the shampoo wet your hair and wash those strands like they did in the old days on a ‘wash board”… rubbing your 2 hands together with strands in between. I am dead serious this is the key to getting the hair color ready to be fully removed.

SHAMPOO TRAIN

• Wet hair
• Cheap lousy shampoo application
• Use plenty of shampoo
• Scrub hands together w/ strands in-between
• leave suds on hair, apply plastic treatment cap
• use heat from hair dryer/sun {helps color molecules loosen}
• leave suds on 45-60 min
• rinse & repeat
• up to 5 times daily

Now the modified version of the Shampoo Train for those of you that don’t want to bother ( always puzzles me) :

MINI-SHAMPOO TRAIN

• Wet hair
• Cheap lousy shampoo
• use plenty of shampoo
• Scrub hands with strands in between
• leave suds on hair while sleeping or 10 minutes
• rinse
• repeat daily

The Full shampoo Train is the best ……….with the mini-Train the next and obviously none… is not so good. I promise you, this step is the beginning of a safe and healthy home Hair Color Correction. This is what is used on celebs whom want the health of their hair kept in tact. As always, I am always watching out for the health of the hair. This is the single healthiest manner of removing artificial hair color ( of any type) from the hair.

The next step is using the color remover I recommend, BUT . . . the day you apply the color remover, you should be prepared to ‘re-color’…..about 50% end up with a decent color the other 50 will be some horrendous shade of Orange/Yellow. Depends on a million and 1 variables. So I recommend that you be prepared to re-color at time of Color Removal. In order to not make the same mistakes, this is when I hope you will take the time to read as many posts that I have written over the past 3 years that have to do with what you would like to do to your hair. Your options have been minimized but still remember - - YOU ARE LEARNING to take control of your own hair.

Many times I will get this question, “how can I take the blond “out” of my hair . . .( for whatever reason) ?? This takes a lot of explaining . . . and there are many times, like right now, when I simply cannot figure out exactly how to explain it…its a bizarre concept. Nor can I think of one other correlation so I can compare it to something familiar for you…………….It is a fairly UNIQUE concept. You cannot take blond “out” of hair. When you are beginning with darker hair and going towards BLOND, the way you get there is NOT by putting “blond” into the hair. It is by taking your own darker pigmented hair color OUT OF YOUR HAIR, that ‘creates’ the blond. We call it, “lifting”in the hair color world which basically equals “lightening”. When I say that 30 Volume Developer “lifts” hair 2-3 levels, it means: when a particular hair color mixed with 30 volume developer is applied to your hair it will “lift” (lighten) your hair 2-3 levels lighter than what it is. Therefore, if you have applied this color and to achieve the blond – the process need to take your existing color out of the hair strand….in order to lighten it. Then does it now make sense to you that blond is really “not” a color….what it is, is your own hair color – lifted out of the strand. Which I hope makes it clear to you why “DURP” is so damned important.

DURP is Dominant-Underlying- Remaining-Pigment. When I explain that if you have “good DURP”, this is what I am referring to. The stages in which Levels of your hair color “leave” the hair strand can leave in a ‘good way’ or they can leave in a “bad way’. What does that depend on? The Lord up above!

Therefore if you were a level 7 and were headed towards a level 10B and ended up with some weird horrific level 9G…that would be what we are talking about. You did not apply a blond in order to achieve that 9-GOLD you applied a tint with a 30 volume developer that was working to subtract your own pigment from your hair strand and what happens is , it stops at some point. The color stops being “lifted” from the hair strand at a certain point, where that color stops is the blond you are left with. There fore it is NOT blond you have put “IN” to the strand, but. . . . Color (your very own pigment) that has been “lifted” out. When I refer to DURP . . . and why it is just so very very important . . . it is for this very reason that as Colorists, as Chemists, as Magicians we have no control over. The DURP you have and the blond you “become” are a total equation of God’s making!

As Colorists, and what I try very hard to teach you here . . . we try to work with your DURP and “counter” it or “enhance” it depending upon what your is. That is the making of a “manufactured blond” . . or a manufactured color of any color for that matter. I know it sounds confusing and is a bit hard to swallow, but just keep reading this post over and over . . . I promise you - - if you do, you will begin to understand the concept of hair coloring and hair coloring gone wrong.

When you have strong orange tones in your hair, those will be the ones that keep your hair from going to that pretty baby blond you want …so we try to use a “blue” based Blond to “counter” the orange pigments, in picking our blond. Using the new MAGMA Blondor bleach that actually bleaches and tones in one step actually tones the hair “blue” while it is lightening it. Just the fact that one entire product has put blue pigment in the mix, should show you how strong that (God-awful) orange pigment really is and why so many people end up with that horrific brassy- orange mess.

Now, once you have got the shampoo-train going on your hair to begin loosening the molecules, the next step should be to begin your research on the product VANISH.

More to come……………… this is Color Removal Month . . .

Killer Chemist