Hair coloring
Hair coloring dates back at least to the ancient Romans, and many societies have used herbal solutions to dye their hair. Modern hair coloring began in 1909 when a French chemist came up with the first commercial hair color.
What is color?
Color is a complex subject, but put simply, it’s the way light reflects from pigments. Change either the pigment or the kind of light, and you change the color we see. There are two main kinds of color: red-yellow (warm shades) and red-blue (cool shades).
1) Roses
Rose shades work surprising well with these skin tones and hair color. Use them on your cheeks and your lips.
2) Lavender
Another good choice to play up your eyes. Works especially well if you have blue eyes
How do I know what sort of coloring I have?
3) Cocoa
Cocoa smudged against the lash line that should work nicely for you.
4) Powdery Pink
With fair skin, a pale pink will work for cheeks, lips and shadow.
5) Yellow
With your coloring, you can get away with yellows, but you have to hit on just the right shade. Choose something pale and use as a shadow or highlighter.
6) Kelly Green
Choose green as an eyeliner choice, especially if you have brown eyes. Top off with lots of black liner.
7) Charcoal Blue
This is another good choice for liners. For younger readers, shiny blues great for night.
8) White
Lots of women choose this color for highlighter. If this appeals to you, choose a soft white.
9) Bronze
Make sure that there is a little yellow in your bronze and then apply to the lids. It will do amazing things for your brown eyes.
10) Rose Browns
1. If you have:
· A skin tone of ivory, peach, creamy beige, light or dark golden brown, or coppery colored, and
· Your eyes are blue, blue-green, hazel, light green, amber or coffee colored
then you have warm coloring and should choose a warm shade for your hair (gold with red highlights, gold or honey brown, copper or mahogany).
2. If you have:
· A skin tone of rosy pink or beige, dark olive, dark brown or ebony and
· Your eyes are light or dark blue, deep green, brown or black
then you have cool coloring and should choose a cool shade for your hair (burgundy highlights, ash or platinum blonde, brown, dark brown, black, gray, or white).
What is hair?
Hair consists of a shaft, which we see, and its root, which is below the skin in a follicle (little pit). The shaft is dead. The living part is the follicle and the few cells just emerging from it at the base of the shaft. This is how the hair grows, by cells at its base subdividing, pushing upwards, hardening and developing pigment. Typically, each of our hairs grows at about ½ inch per month and lives anywhere from 3 to 5 years.
Hair is made of keratin, the same protein that’s in our fingernails and skin, plus some other proteins, and a pigment called melanin. There are two kinds of melanin: eumelanin (shades from brown to black) and phaeomelanin (yellowish-blond, ginger and red colors).
What are the ingredients of permanent hair color?
There are two main ones, ammonia and hydrogen peroxide. Ammonia opens the cuticle of the hair shaft so the color molecules can enter. Hydrogen peroxide bleaches the hair so that new color can be added to create the desired shade. Some permanent colors come with more natural ingredients than others, but will likely still have some synthetic chemicals as well.
How is hair color changed?
The hair shaft is like a tube. The outside is the cuticle and inside is the cortex with the pigment. Any applied coloring goes through the cuticle to the cortex, but it may or may not interact with your natural pigment.
If you have dark hair and want it lighter, there are 2 steps: (1) your color is bleached and (2) the new color is added
If you have light-colored hair and want it darker, only step (2) is needed.
Hair coloring is thought of in 3 levels, based on how long the coloring lasts.
· Level 1, semi-permanent hair color - The color molecules are very tiny. They go through the hair’s cuticle into the cortex where your natural color is, but they don’t interact with your natural pigment. Because they’re so tiny, they leave the hair more easily and so this coloring level isn’t permanent. It lasts through about 6 to 12 shampoos. It also doesn’t lighten your hair because there’s no peroxide or ammonia present. Nor does it cover gray more than about 50%.
