I noticed a lot of people have been searching for this sort of information and winding up at my blog so figured I would do a little blurb on this, well a series of blurbs. A lot of you have been asking me the same thing on my Self Portrait Sunday posts also, so here we go. I’ll have to edit some pictures and add those in later on today.

Now before I write this out I should note that I am NOT a beautician or a hair dresser. I have no degrees in this and so should not be taken as any kind of authority, just someone who does this a lot and is writing about her experiences. If you try the things that I mention here and it doesn’t work out and your hair gets screwed up, don’t sue me, you won’t get anything. If you’re having doubts, go to a a hairdresser and ask them to give you pointers or pay them to do it for you.

If your hair does get screwed up (and I HAVE screwed up my hair in the past) remember that it’s just hair. You can chop it all off and it’ll grow back within a few months and you can try again. That’s one of the beautiful things about hair.

1. What do you mean funky colors?
I mean colors like “Pimpin Purple” and “Nuclear Red”. I use Special Effects hair dye when I dye my hair but there are also colors like Manic Panic. I prefer Special Effects because it doesn’t mistreat my hair, in fact my hair is often in better condition AFTER I dye it than before even if I leave the dye on a couple of hours. I get my dye from Amphigory but if you google you can probably find different stores that you might be able to go to instead of ordering from and shipping the dye to you.

2. Do you bleach your hair before dyeing it?
That depends on what I’m doing. The first time (recently) that I dyed my hair myself instead of going to my hair dresser. I did bleach my hair first. I did that because I was wanting to dye my hair pink, and it had most recently been purple and blue. Those colors are darker than the pink, and also my natural hair color (even though I haven’t seen it much recently) is a dark blonde, and I knew from discussions with my hair dresser and several other people I know who are beauticians that there was a good chance the pink would go orange-ish because of that, so I bleached my hair twice, and I used a toner too to try and get some of the yellow tones out, at the end of the day my hair was mostly white at the top and a pale yellow throughout, but my hair was feeling pretty grungy so I stopped bleaching, rinsed my hair and waited until the next day to dye it.
I’ve since found out I might have been better getting a color stripper instead of a toner…and using that before I bleached or instead of bleach, but I haven’t done the bleach thing since to let my hair recuperate.

3. How do you put the dye on?
Very carefully!

FIRST THINGS FIRST
If you’re going to dye your hair make sure you’re NOT doing it in a carpeted area. If you’re using a funky color dye it can be HELL to get out of carpet, but even a normal Clairol dye is going to stain anything that it can, that’s the whole point of dye.
So, also make sure you’re not wearing any clothes that you care about or that are irreplaceable, or someone else’s. I have a “special” tank top that I wear when I’m dyeing my hair. It’s three years old, ratty and already stained with various shades of dye, so it doesn’t matter if more gets added to the mess. I put dark towels down all over the floor where I’m working, and I wear grungy jeans or PJs too. If my son’s asleep I sometimes just go naked. It’s easier to wash skin than clothes.
If you have pets keep them out of the area, too. I figure some of these things are common sense…but we wound up with a green chicken once because my step-father didn’t keep her out of the area that he was painting…so yeah.

Also having some gloves would be a great idea. Most packages of Clairol come with gloves, but most funky colored dye just comes is a bottle, but rubber gloves are pretty cheap to get. Amphigory sells them for less than a buck a pair, and I’ve also picked them up at Sally Beauty Supply before for around $3 for a pack of two pairs of gloves. You can not get them but your hands WILL be stained blue, green or purple (or whatever color you just dyed your hair) for several days even with liberal scrubbing.

Petroleum jelly is something also useful to get to prevent your face from changing colors. Spread some of that around your hair line and over your ears to help make it easier for you to wash the dye off your face. I’ve got some wipes that say they’ll help get the dye off your skin, but they LIE. They just spread it around. Baby Wipes though, they work fairly well, they at least lessen the color but it’s still there.

READ THE DIRECTIONS ON THE BOTTLE.
Also a common sense thing, but you never know. While I’m writing here about what goes on with Special Effects because that’s what I use, if you’re using Manic Panic or Punky Color they’re going to have slightly different directions. The basics (open bottle, put dye on hair, wait, rinse out) they’re not going to change, but depending on what’s in the dye might depend on how long you’re supposed to leave the dye in and all the rest of it.

For example, Special Effects labels say to leave the dye on about 15 minutes. I usually leave it on at least a half hour, this last time I left it on two hours, because I was dyeing over Atomic Pink and didn’t pre-bleach. Special Effects is vegetable based dye so it doesn’t ruin your hair, other dyes might not be so gentle so pay careful attention, read the labels, ask the manufacturers or the shops that sell the dye. They should have some idea what they’re selling.

Any hair dye and bleach that I’ve come across suggests using a strand test first BUT honestly I’ve never done that. I don’t know anyone that has, but if you’re not sure if you’re going to be allergic to something in the dye or how it’s going to look DO IT. Everyone’s hair is different.

MOVING ON.
For me using Special Effects means that I should wash my hair with shampoo prior to application, but not condition it, as the conditioner can make it harder for the dye to take hold in your hair.

Wash your hair and dry it off, put the petroleum jelly around your face and ears and so on, put your gloves on and then apply the dye liberally starting at the roots, and comb it through until all the hair is covered.

That part sounds fairly simple, but it can be really tricky when you’re working by yourself. I find that there’s usually a good section of hair in the back of my head which I either miss entirely or don’t get as well covered as the rest of my hair. Massaging the dye into your hair like you’re shampooing can help with that, or getting someone else to help you color your hair is another option. I tend to recruit my Mum to help out.

So, after your hair is covered, set a timer or just wait watching a movie or something that you know isn’t going to leave the dye on your hair too long. Rinse out your hair. You probably want to keep the gloves on while you do this because of previously mentioned problems of coloring your hands with hair dye. If you’re not intending to streak your hair, you can use conditioner on your hair at this point, but if you are, don’t.

Dry your hair and enjoy your new look.

I’ll talk more about streaking your hair in a later post. Some of the steps are the same, but there are a few differences because there are a couple of different ways you can streak your hair. I’ll get into it though, never fear.

Pictures will be added later