Clairol’s Nice & Easy Worked Well As A Temporary Cover-Up

I have always loved colouring my hair since as young as I can remember. I first dyed my hair when I was about 14 years old and it was really experimental – it was me, my best friend and a box dye. I’ve always wanted to go blonde in particular but have never been able to master it. When you have black hair (or very dark brown if you don’t believe hair can ever be ‘black’ in pigment) as soon as you get close enough to ‘yellow gold’ that’s the lightest it’ll get without professional help. I am very lucky to have quite resilient hair so it has never come out in chunks or fallen out *thank God* but it always gets left extremely coarse, fragile and in constant need of moisturising oil.

Before professional help: golden tones

After professional help: ash tones

So last year I decided to go blonde again by myself – I managed to lift my colour with peroxide bleach three times and got it to the lightest it’s ever been and got rid of the majority of orange/yellow tones with a violet toner and purple shampoos and conditioners to keep as much brassiness away as possible. I was still left with a warm gold colour but it was manageable… just about. I knew I needed professional help so I went to my local hair salon in Woolwich, Beyond The Fringe and my hairdresser Sam helped me sort out my mess. She added highlights and lowlights to blend the colours in better and toned my hair and put on a hair treatment to give back the moisture that it lacked. Since I’ve gone for a short haircut, I’ve decided to go back to dark and been having glossing treatments to get me by without a full tint. I have the glossing service done at the Aveda Institute – you can add on a blow-dry for £15 extra but because my hair’s so short now I let it dry naturally. The colour has been fading and it got really light after I’ve been using my new cleansing shampoo.

Today, I decided that I could no longer walk around with visible roots, I purchased the Clairol Nice & Easy Hair Lasting Colour from Sainsbury’s. It’s is a non-permanent tint that lasts for about 8 washes. I got number 77 – medium ash brown which was ideal as the ash tones would help to minimise the red/orange tones I have in my hair and leave me with a nice brown colour that isn’t too warm. I was a bit skeptical that the colour would work but it did. My porous hair took the colour and after using my Aveda Damage Remedy deep conditioning treatment my hair felt loads better afterwards.

Now it looks better and I’ve bought myself a little bit of time (for my hair) to relax until my next professional colour appointment. You can see that the ends are still a little lighter but I knew it probably wouldn’t fully cover so I am very pleased with the outcome. I also had a bit of pink in my hair from before which I kept because I still want to be able to change up my colour so I left the front two strips closest to my face free from the dye to keep it light so I can change the colour when I want to more easily. I really do love home-dye jobs but it really is better to let the professionals to help you out. Yes, it costs like 10x more but then again, it’s 10x more worth it (and kinder to your hair) in the long run. I only like using box dyes now as a temporary means to cover up a colour but will always go back to the salon to have it done.

Happy colouring!

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