All fellow blondes know the eternal struggle of maintaining the perfect blonde tone. Give it a few weeks after having the hair dyed and the colour starts to transform into an almost golden orange shade. Of course, to prevent this you should use a purple shampoo regularly to cancel out any unwanted colours. Freshly bleached blonde hair is almost always going to look yellowy/orangey in shade. To achieve the desired blonde shade you want (be it platinum, silver, ashy, caramel etc.), your hairdresser must tone it to remove the yellow/orange shades.
I'm quite an impatient and frugal person when it comes to my hair. Plus I am also one of those people who have said "yaaa I really like it" to the hairdresser after doing my hair and go home crying "I look so ugly!! I HATE IT!". So I have very low expectations of hairdressers and their capability to make my hair look the way I want it. (I'm not saying all the hairdressers I've been to have left me disappointed, that is defiantly not the case. I've walked out of the salon with a smile on my face too :D) Thats when I decided to take matters into my own hands, at least that way when I fail I'm not too disappointed as I haven't spent too much money and I took the risk so thats what I get.
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| BEFORE |
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| AFTER |
So years of messing around with my hair have gone by and it is time for my hair's annual 'freshen-up'. I adore ashy blonde hair and thats the colour I always strive to achieve. So I decided to tone my hair myself with a professional toner. Previously I had been using Crazy Colour's Lavender hair dye as a toner. This worked as long as I washed it out of my hair after 10-15 minutes. Any longer and my hair would be a shade of purple. It was time to bin my ratchet habits and do it the right way.
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| Crazy Colour Lavender (source) |
So after hours or research online and on youtube I found the toner that was going to do the trick. That toner being, Wella's Colour Charm in T18 Lightest Ash Blonde. I toned my hair about 2 weeks ago now.
I found youtube to be highly helpful in my quest for the right toner. It was so useful to see before and after videos of a person who used the product as it gave me and idea of what my hair would look like after it. It's important to mention that the end product will look different on everyone. If you have blue tinges in your blonde hair it might make your hair bluer etc.
Wella T18 is a cool toned toner. So expect cool toned hair.
Here's my video on the topic - Please excuse all the 'eeemms' and 'umms'! Such a horrible speech habit I didn't even realise I had until editing that video haha! More info bellow video with instructions.
What you need:
20 Volume Developer
Wella Colour Charm T18 Toner
Mixing bowl
Measuring cup
Dye brush
Use 1 part toner to 2 parts developer.
For example: I used the whole bottle of toner and double the measurement of that in developer. Mix the two and apply to hair. Leave in your hair for no more than 30 minutes. Wash out! All the instructions are on the box too so be sure to read them!!
Apply the mixture to wet hair. I left the toner in my hair for 20 minutes as it started to get very grey very fast. I was a bit paranoid!
What I would do next time:
Firstly I would use half the measurement of the toner/developer mixture. The developer and toner mixture was too large so I had a bit of waste. I have long hair and I did not need to use the whole bottle of toner. Secondly I would leave the toner in my hair for the 30 minutes as it's even after fading already after 2 weeks so even if it was any bit grey it wouldn't last long until it was the ideal shade.
I'm delighted with how my hair turned out. I have used the Crazy Colour dye since the toning of my hair. I used it anytime I felt it was getting a bit golden in colour.
If you have any questions on the topic feel free to ask :)
Also, I really enjoyed making that video so if you enjoyed it also please let me know. I would be interested in implementing video footage into my blog posts!
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| Why am I so cool like? haha |
Until next time,
A very cool Sinéad x
