Trying a New Dye

The other night I decided to try a brand of dye I haven't used before. Normally to lighten my roots I use bleach and then sometimes I use a blonde dye to give it a nicer tone, but I've never tried lightening my roots with a box blonde. Even though box dyes work out more expensive, they're much easier to use, so I thought I'd give it a try to see if it lifted the colour enough. I have to say, I think it did a pretty good job.

I used Live Salon Permanent dye in Extra Light Ash Blonde. It was super easy to mix and apply. It did have a chemically smell and it burnt my eyes initially (the vapor that is, I didn't actually get any product in my eyes), but not nearly as badly as the brand I usually use. It only took a few blinks to get rid of that initial offensive odour which tends to hurt my eyes and leave them watering. The instructions don't say to section your hair off, and it isn't strictly necessary, but I find it makes application a lot easier and helps to ensure its even throughout and there aren't any spots missed. I have fairly fine hair and not a tonne of it so sectioning would probably be more important to those with thicker hair.

I find dying hair much easier when I start at the front and work my way back, but as I bleach regularly, I alternate each time I do it to prevent the hair at the front getting too damaged (wherever you start the dye will be on longer there, therefore being more likely to damage the hair). Starting at the back can be a little trickier but it really isn't as bad with box dyes because you can just massage it into a chunk of hair rather than having to paint it into little sections. Once my roots were completely saturated with the dye, I left it on for the recommended 30 minutes. I then washed it off and used the included conditioner (which smells rather nice) and this was the result:

Left: Before, Right: After

As you can see, my roots didn't go a nice white blonde but have stayed rather yellow. But I don't think it is any worse than my usual results with bleach (although I've been told there's a better brand I should use next time I stock up.) I could probably have left it on a touch longer, but I didn't feel like that would make a great deal of difference as I was checking it periodically and it didn't really appear there had been much change in shade in the final ten minutes; I'm also hesitant to risk leaving a product on longer when my hair is already quite fragile. It should also be noted the pictures were taken under bright white light, so the contrast is actually less noticeable in normal indoor lighting which tends to be more yellow, but under neons or outside in the sun you can definitely see the yellow. The yellowy roots are still an improvement on mousy blonde though! And I will fix them up eventually I'm sure.

Hope everyone is well!