WHAT IS HAIR COLOR CORRECTION?

It happened. You tried to lighten your hair at home, and it came out looking even worse than you could have ever imagined. So what do you do now? You fix it. And it’s not as difficult as it may seem. Here’s everything you need to know about color correction for your hair.

So what is hair color correction, you ask? It’s exactly what it sounds like: fixing the undesirable result of a color job gone wrong. Hair color mishaps can happen to the best of us and for different reasons. But your hair color disaster can easily be fixed in one of a few ways.

Color correction involves either toning out unwanted brassiness, dying your hair darker, or lightening your hair even more to achieve the desired effect. Here’s what you need to know about hair color correction.

When a hair color session goes wrong, you’ll likely go into damage control mode. But though you want to fix the splotchy, brassy mess as quickly as possible, you may need to weather the storm for a few weeks to protect the health of your hair.

A professional stylist can help determine how much damage has been done and help come up with a plan to correct the color mishap. If the damage was minor, you may be able to fix it with a quick dye job that can be done immediately. But if your mane is dry and brittle from bleach damage, you might need multiple bleaching and toning sessions spread out over several weeks to get the color right—after you’ve let your locks rest and recuperate for a couple of weeks, that is.

Your strands aren’t just one color. There are many underlying red, yellow, and orange pigments that combine to make your hair the color you see. And if you’ve ended up with an unflattering brassy orange or garish yellow after attempting to lighten your locks with bleach, chances are you didn’t leave the bleach in long enough to lift those unwanted pigments away. (Here’s an orange hair color correction how-to, by the way).

After allowing your mane to recoup from the bleach for a week or so, you can attempt to lighten your hair further. But proceed with caution! Bleach strips your hair of essential proteins and nutrients, and repeated exposure can be very damaging. An experienced stylist can help you retain healthy, lustrous hair while still achieving the bombshell blonde you’re after. A restorative hair mask can help protect and restore your bleach-damaged mane. Make sure to follow our blonde hair care tips to help care for your dyed hair.  

Color Correction with Toner

Hair toner is used to adjust the shade of brassy tones, turning your locks a cooler blonde or light brown. The color toner you should choose depends on which brassy shade your bad bleach job has left you with.

If your hair has come out more yellow, you’ll need a purple toner or purple shampoo. If your mane is oranger than you were hoping, you’ll need a toner with blue shades.

Color Correction with Dye

Often the least damaging and best color correction for bleached hair or hair that is too light is to dye it darker. A good stylist will first “fill” your hair to insert pigment back into your strands and give them warmth and prevent your end color from appearing flat and muddy. A second dye session will bring your mane to the color you desire and provide depth.

Bleach happens. Luckily, there’s always a solution. Now go rock that perfect color! Check out more John Frieda hair color tips here.