I color at home for both the cost, and the convenience. Pick up a kit at the store, use it whenever I have 30 minutes to spare. And I color red, so for me it’s Feria, because the reds are so deep and gorgeous and shiny and they last longer than any other red I’ve used.
I often go red as well and second (or whatever we’re on) the praise for Feria. I’ve been playing around with dark blond as well lately and have rather liked it.
I have pretty awesome natural red, luckily. When I do want to punch it up a bit, I’ll do a semi-permanent which washes out in a month or so, and it’s just a shade or two deeper than my own. I can’t see paying $50 for something I can do on my own for $8, when the results are pretty much identical (I have pretty good variance in my natural colour so it looks highlighted even when I use a dye).
Yes, it really does! Once in college I turned my normally medium-to-dark brown hair a bizarre combination of black with purple highlights by not watching the time and leaving the dye in only an extra 5 minutes. And the fact that the color was called “Plum Brown” probably should have been my first clue that it wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had! I got away with it due to the fact that K-State was fielding a decent basketball team, so people probably just thought I was a deranged fan sporting “Royal Purple” hair.
I also turned my hair a wacky shade of orange by messing with Sun-In in high school.
Mostly now I just cover grays, and as long as I stay within my color range, I’ve had good luck with various brands of at-home kits, and just touch up every 4-6 weeks. I do want to try the new L’Oreal one with the dye and highlights.
I’ve bleached my hair at home since I was 18. Salons seem to do a through-and through coloring, which makes dark roots very visible and looks unnatural: blond hair is by itself always darker underneath.
At home, I can do just the top, in an irregular way, making highlights. The effect looks very natural.
I’ve had my hair done at salons and am always disappointed in the results. Once I spent $175 and I could not tell they had done anything (subtle my ass) unless I was under the noon day Florida sun in mid August.
I used to use temporary hair color that has since been discontinued that was fantastic, it lasted about a week, it was awesome. I would go red, go black way, way too frequently. It was fun.
I just did a temporary dye (black) last night for Halloween (I’m a fabulous fallen angel) and my blondish/reddish/brownish hair was exactly the wrong color for the costume and I can’t bear the thought of wearing a wig for as long as I’ll need to (possibly 12 hours). My husband swore I would hate it, however, I really, really like it. It isn’t a harsh black since it is a temporary color, although I think on my lighter bits it might be a bit purpley for my tastes, but I’m thinking about going with a permanent color, just not sure how long I should wait, this color won’t be gone for 8-10 shampoos and I have no idea how it will fade out.
Will temporary haircolor futz with a permanent over top of it? Or should I just wait it out?
BTW, there are always coupons for hair colors. It is very, very cheap to do it yourself if you match sales with coupons. Free sometimes.
Hrm. Just you you can be prepared, temporary black dye has a tendency to stain hair, regardless of its label of ‘temporary’, especially in lightish brown or lighter hair.