So. Much. Face! It’s for a good cause I promise ;) This isn’t a self gratifying post where I just stare at my mug all day, instead this is look back over the years wow that I’ve been in the blonde spectrum of the hair colour chart. That’s right, back in 2012, almost an entire three years ago, I bit the bullet and got every last strand of my tresses bleached. I went from long dark brown locks to shorter blonde hair that over the years I’ve altered in tone, shade and even non-natural colours on the odd occasion. Today is an ode to all those different looks I experimented with and may be helpful for anyone else debating whether to take the blonde plunge.
I started things off pretty stark went full whack on the blonde spectrum. I kept highlights running throughout the lengths to breakup the colour and give a bit of variation but there was no going back from here! Each trip to the salon chair past this point I continued to amp up the blonde, with more highlights, a bucket load more bleach and some dried out ends I was a woman on a mission! Considering my natural colour is dark brown, I counteracted these chestnut tones by repeating the word ‘blonde’ every time I visited a hairdresser. This resulted in me verging onto the edge of ice blonde, I went there! My hair became cooler, the natural colour was completely lost and I was a fully fledged blonde gal!
You’d think by this point I was well educated in the world of toners and purple shampoos to keep the brassy tones at bay. Sadly this was not the case, instead I used a range of blonde specific shampoos and conditioners that in hindsight did a great job of slowly turning my locks towards those unwanted orange and yellow shades. It was only when I moved back to London from Bournemouth that I began to bring more of my natural colour back into my hair and stepped away from the brass.
Initially breaking things up with highlights, darker blonde sections were added by balayage through the lengths of my locks. I loved this finish this gave and vowed to stick to the more natural tones. Continuing along this path for a couple of salon visits I then began to grow out the blonde thus reintroducing my darker colour around the roots. Not only does this require less upkeep, the overall condition of my hair has improved. I’ve fallen for the softer and messy blonde look which retains sections of brown to keep the finish more natural. I’m tempted to go a tad blonder at the tips for the summer but who knows, one day I might go back to the dark side ;)
