Thursday, February 28, 2013

Metallic Salts and boxed hair color! DANGER DANGER!

     Let's talk about hair color! I LOVE that I am able to do so much with hair color! I can enhance the hair's natural beauty, I can down play negative tones, or I can even get really dramatic with hair color and use vibrant wonderful rich colors! There is a whole new world opened up when it comes to hair color. Gone are the days where we are stuck with what "God gave us".

     Before I dive right in, let me touch on the history of hair color. Did you know that the art of coloring your hair has been around for centuries? Back in the greek/roman days, the people worshiped the gods and would often mimick them wanting to be more like them. Their idea that the gods were blonde, made them seem more angelic. In order to achieve lightening their hair they often used pollen and gold dust. During the Roman Empire (27 B.C.E. - 476 C.E.) this is when many traders and slaves came to Rome and the surrounding cities during Rome's expansion, exposing the Romans to a wide variety of hair colors. Men and woman alike, gave up simple and frugal customs that defined early Rome, so a popular way for the to ornament themselves was through the use of hair dyes. The most popular color was blond. Roman prostitues were required to dye their hair blond to set then apart from the other citizens, but there were many men and women that followed suit and dyed their hair blond as well. The most dramatic hair coloring effects could only be afforded my Rome's wealthiest, as they used gold dust for their hair.   Many used henna, this is a natural plant based dye that delivered a reddish brown color, while others used berries, vinegar or crushed nutshells.  Perhaps one of the most unusual hair dyes to make the hair black was made from leeches and vinegar! This mixture fermented for 2 months, they then applied it to their hair and sit in the sun to bake it in their hair! THANK the LORD hair coloring has become more pleasant for me! I don't think I could make it thru one of those hair coloring sessions.

     Now let's get to the nitty gritty. Never I mean NEVER use hair color from the store! It's bad bad bad! You can never tell the out come especially if you are a first time user. Metallic salts have been used in hair color since the 1800's. Metallic salts fall under the category of progressive dyes, this means with every application the hair color is going to go darker and darker. Over time the hair is going to feel rough. Metallic salts are extremely reactive to other chemicals! If you try to use most hair color removers (because the hair is too dark now from the progressive darkening) major chemical reactions with the metallic salts are going to occur inside the hair shaft and that can result in horrible burning fumes or even smoking!

     So what about Henna? Ok what about it? Even though its supposed to be natural and organic and healthy, it still contains... YOU GUESSED IT! Metallic Salts are added to henna to make it warmer or cooler. So beware of what you are putting in your hair! Boxed color that use metallic dyes are:


  • Nice 'N' Easy
  • Feria
  • Grecian Formula
     What do you do if you have used these? Be patient! Congratulate yourself because you are now considered to be in our special client category known as "corrective color client". Even if you have only used it once, it will take several visits to repair the damage, get rid of what you have and to get your hair healthier. A quick fix will only lead to quick damage! 

     This is the reason that your hair will look "fried", "dead" and damaged! Your hair is having a continuous chemical reaction to metallic salts in the hair! My advice is go to a professional, and have professional hair color used on you. You will be far happier with the outcome, because we have been trained to use color and know what is best for your particular hair type. 


   


Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Professional salon products vs. store brands

      I am a licensed professional cosmetologist and have been since 2003, so for the past 10 years hair has been my main focus. I have made it my business and I love what I do. I started this blog because I am asked ALL the time about hair. So with that being said, let's just dive right in to the main focus of this blog, professional salon products vs. store brands. Before I begin, let me just go ahead and state that I am not going to promote any one product over another, so I am in no way benefiting or profitting from this in anyway, this is simply me passing along information that I have been trained in.

      Salon products are professionaly diagnosed for your hairs specific needs and is going to be more suited to you than something you have picked up off your local store shelf. General use shampoo (this is a shampoo you would buy for your whole family to use) won't fix your partner's dandruff issue, your babies cradle cap and your frizzy, dry ends. Did you know that 80% of us misdiagnose our own hair types and purchase the wrong products?

     Price is a good indicator of quality when you are trying to choose your hair care products. Higher priced products contain better quality ingredients and contain more of them. A good example is essential oils, in the salon brands they are going to be more pure and more of them as opposed to store brands that use non-pure versions. If you buy really cheap versions, you are going to get exactly what you pay for.

     When you build a house, you always want to make sure that you have a good strong foundation. The same holds true for your shampoo and conditioner, that is the foundation for your hair and a good hairstyle. Shampoo should ALWAYS be follwed by a conditioner. This is because shampoo is negatively charged and conditioner is positively charged thus helpting to restore the acid mantel and protect the hair.

     Professional brands use gentler surfactants (this is a type of soap used in shampoo) in concentrated amounts, this means you will use far less product than a grocery store brand to achieve the same result. Surfactants are the most important ingredients in shampoo, because they clean and they create the lather. There are three different kinds of surfactants:

  1. ammonium laurel sulfate
  2. sodium laurel sulfate
  3. sodium laureth sulfate
     Sodium laureth sulfate is the most expensive of the three, but it is the most gentle. Salon brands most usually use sodium laureth sulfate.  Ammonium laurel sufate is the harshest. It strips the hair of very important and necessary oils and will strip chemically enhanced color from your hair. It is also the least expensive, so most store brands will have ammonium laurel sulfate. Long story short; laureth is good, laurel should be avoided at all costs. 

     Speaking of costs, I was recently asked by a friend about the costs of salon products. Did you know salon products are more concentrated than store brands, so a bottle of salon brand is going to last much longer than store brands. In the end, you are not spending anymore (if any) for salon brands compared to store brands.