Friday, October 25, 2013

How to get pastel hair (from dark Asian hair)

         I think the pastel hair color trend has been going around for quite some time now and it's definitely a super fun way to bring a little novelty into your life. It's nothing complicated if you were lucky enough to be born with platinum blonde hair; putting those pretty, magical looking colors would be as simple as one, two, three. Just dilute the color with conditioner, put it in your hair for less than an hour and voila! Beautiful, pastel hair is achieved. However, for those of us who weren't as fortunate, especially those of us with dark, stubborn, Asian hair, getting a pastel shade in your hair is almost impossible(more like asking for death -_-). I was hesitant and unsure at first, but with a little experimentation, I think got the basic steps to how to achieve a pastel shade for dark, Asian hair.
        In the past summer I had gone to the hair salon hoping to get a light ash blonde color to celebrate the warm weather. However, to my disappointment, the shade came out more golden/ yellow than ashy. So I went ahead and took this serious business into my own hands and decided it's time for an amateur to rise above and shine. With my basic knowledge of the color wheel, I figured purple and blue would counteract orange and yellow, so using the little bit of Color Jamz semi permanent hair color in "not so shy violet", I painted the concentrated dye onto the more brassy bits of my hair. To my surprise, the end result was an ashy, blue based, blonde color that I had always dreamed of! This was a nice color to keep until my little curious mind decided to try and step a little farther.
        It had been quite some time that I've been utterly intrigued by the dreamy, magical colors of the rainbow that all the fashion divas have been rocking in their hairs and I just couldn't put it off any more. I decided it was time for me to journey down that magical path as well and attempt to have pastel hair on my stubborn, Asian locks. At this point my hair was a medium ash blonde starting to fade into that nasty, brassy, orange mess again and I was not going to let the non-sense continue any longer. With much researching from Google and Youtube I decided that I was ready. I purchased Punky Color semi-permanent hair color in Violet and mixed it along with the Color Jams plus some white conditioner to achieve a purple that I was satisfied with. Then, I applied this mixture all over my head, of course first concentrating on the more brassy bits of my hair. Left it in my hair for about 45 minutes, and behold! Beautiful, soft, MAGICAL, pastel hair that resembled the hairs of characters from my little pony. I was instantly floating in the heaven of satisfactory. I love rocking my new lavender hair and being a new member of the magical haired species of fashion divas (I wish). Nevertheless, I was proud enough of myself for many days after my success and I love the color so much that I now believe I was born to have light purple hair in my head...forever.


Below are detailed steps/ recipe that I've concluded after experimentation (all materials can be bought that Sally beauty supply) You can also watch my tutorial on youtube (insert video here):

part 1: BLEACHING
materials:
- quick blue bleaching powder
- 30% developer
- gloves
- mixing bowl
- brush

mix bleach powder and developer in a 1:2 ratio (twice the amount of developer than bleach powder), apply mixture to entire head, tips first, then roots (roots develop faster since it's closer to your scalp and it's warmer there). Develop for no more than one hour, checking periodically to see the level of color that's been lifted. Wash out when a light yellow color is achieved.


part 2: COLORING
materials:
- temporary hair color (in the color that you want to achieve but concentrated)
- white conditioner
- optional: (white lady or silver lady toner (T14/T18) with 10% developer) *** only do this if you feel like your hair is super patchy and needs to be toned to even out the color first
- gloves
- mixing bowl
- brush

dilute the hair dye with white conditioner (take the brush, dip it in the dye, and then swirl it in a bowl of conditioner, I find this the easiest). Apply to hair concentrating on the more brassy bits. (if your hair is not light enough make this mixture a bit darker than you would on lighter hair) Saturate all of your hair and let it "process" (not really processing since it's just basically colored conditioner) for a good 30 - 60 minutes. Wash out, and voila! Enjoy your new, magical, pastel hair. :)

***If you bleach your hair and it does not look even or the color is still very orange, tone first with white lady or silver lady with cooling violet additive. Then put in the color that you want using the conditioner method.

A trick: If you want more of a gray tone, use the cooling violet additive with a 10% developer and leave that in your hair to process, the end result will be gray! :D

Any way hope you guys enjoyed this long, tragically poor written essay about my experience with pastel hair. And hope it was helpful!

Before -> After

before: black hair 
before: black hair





after salon: golden blonde?
After self toning: ash blonde



                                                                                  ...



Final product after putting color: lavender/ pastel purple
Pastel purple/ lavender hair



11 comments:

  1. Hi there :) I'd like to say that your hair turned out great! I'm in the process of turning my hair to the lightness you had when you toned your hair to the ash color, yet I toned my hair and added cooling violet at the same time ( it didn't have much effect , it was my fault for trying to process both at the same time and ended up damaging my hair more for no reason ) I did counter act some orange and yellow in my hair though! I was wondering what you meant by the silver and white lady toner? and why you used only a 10% developer? I have a 20 and 30% developer on hand so would it not turn out good if it was that much of developer intensity.. if that makes sense! but I really trust your advice and your process makes sense. I've been coloring my own hair ever since I got my hair done once. I had to bleach my hair, also done by myself, from a brown and aqua/green color so it took two sessions and I did them back to back -__- SO SORRY if this was a long and rambling post. I don't go on blogspot actually but this is your blog and I would appreciate any sort of advice as in if I should tone it again before trying to go with the punky colour violet dye + conditioner method? My email is cassandracallos@gmail.com . I would love the help and thank you in advance if you are reading this <3

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  2. I'd also like to mention I am not that light as you, I'm on the tanner/yellow side of beige.. so the blonde I have atm is night as flattering as I'd like since it could be really yellow and sometimes brownish orange due to lighting and the toner not fully processed in my hair. If you can give a suggestion as to what shade of blonde or color should I be at then what to do with the violet dye, I'd love to hear your opinion too !

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    Replies
    1. HI Casand,
      I'd suggest getting your hair lighter so that it turns a yellow color with minimal orange. When it is light yellow you may use wella's white lady or silver lady to tone it with a 10 percent peroxide. It will turn a ash blonde which is flattering on most people. You can also use the method I did which is mix some purple dye in conditioner. This will also neutralize brassiness. With the cooling violet additive my friend has used it with a 10 percent peroxide and gotten superb results and a head of beautiful dark gray hair!

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  3. Wow the pastel purple looks really good on you! I wouldn't be able to pull it off -_-
    x J. from I ate noodles for breakfast

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  4. your hair looks beautiful! I really wanna dye my hair lilac now! my parents would probably freak XD hehe

    http://annaindeed.blogspot.com

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  5. Hi! I'm the dorky girl who talked to you at All That Korean BBQ on Saturday. I wish I got a picture of you, but I felt like such a geek! Just checked my Pinterest. And people are still pinning your tutorial from my board. :) Hope to bump into you again!

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  6. Very cool color I may try this myself although I do not have dark Asian hair I do like this color

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  8. So great!I love it! Im also into pastel hair and stuff. Heres my site:
    https://everythinglovesyou.blogspot.com

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