D.I.Y Purple Ombré Galaxy Hair

Finally! Finally I dyed my hair. The stripping process only took me a week BUT it was a bloody long week. I so badly wanted to dye it and the time for dying took too long to come round *cries* but alas the day arrived, the deed was done and I now have purple hair!

This post is all about how I went to this *inserts photo* from this *inserts another photo*

So my hair at the beginning was a very deep red color (although the photo shows it to be kind of pink - stupid lighting). It had a base of permanent red from when I had been to the hair dressers to get it "professionally" coloured (by professional I mean I wanted a deep pink/red (almost like Tulip from Directions) NON-permanent color with no bleaching of my previous hair (which was possible) but what I got was a big bleaching session and a permanent colour - more on that in a future most!) and then when that faded (like red does) a layer of Rose Red, Mandarin, Vermillion Red and a tad bit of Poppy Red by Directions all mixed together on top - you'll gather from this post and more to come that I like .. no wait: LOVE to mix all different dyes together - so yeah, you can imagine it was pretty difficult to get out - BUT with an intense four/five days of 3 Vitamin C washes and two colour removing sessions (everywhere smelled of rotten eggs so bad *gags*) and NO bleach (YAY!) I got it to a weird mix of blonde and orange with a few streaks of stubborn pink.

BUT ANYWAY: These are the colours and equipment I used for ma hairrr *inserts a collection of poor quality pictures - darn iPhone camera and crappy lighting*

The dyes I used were Directions Lilac, Midnight Blue and Violet. I also used Adore Raging Red and Aquamarine.

The equipment I had was a wide tooth comb (not in the pictures), two black towels (not in pictures. I used one to place over the toilet seat where I mixed my dyes and one for the floor so any drips fell on that. I then used the messier one for my hair once I washed the dye out), a plastic bag (you can use a shower cap but it will get very messy), some make-up remover wipes (they take off a lot of the dye on your face if you're like me and don't use patroleum jelly. They are also useful if you drop dye on the tiles/sink and bath basin etc - they just aren't very good to get dye out of walls (trust me, I've tried...), a shiz tonne of conditioner (white), three plastic pots for mixing dyes and a tint brush for applying!

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So my hair is dyed in three different colours (section things) as I attempted an ombré that I am yet to perfect. The top part (roots) is your standard (I dunno ... eggplant?) purple. To get this colour I mixed a 2:2:1:1.5 ratio of Adore Raging Red, Aquamarine, Directions Violet and white conditioner and mixed it all together *inserts picture* It looked kinda like this.

For the mid part of the lengths is a ratio of 3:1:0.5:2:0.5 of Directions Violet, Midnight Blue, Lilac, conditioner and Adore Raging Red. It came out as a really nice violet colour *inserts photo below* (the dark bits of the image are the violet pieces however they don't look violet here because of lighting and instagram filter *shameful look*).

Finally the ends are very simple with a mix of 2:0.5:1 (Directions Lilac, Violet and conditioner - I had to darken this colour a tad otherwise it wouldn't have covered the orangy/pink/blonde mess).

I seperated the three mixtures using the biggest bowl for my mid lengths as I needed the most dye for that and the smallest bowl for my ends. I split my hair in half down the middle and tied one half into a pig tail. With the free half, I spilt it again at the ear tying the back section up into a pig tail. This way I could work in sections, getting an even coverage. I started at my roots with the first mix in the middle bowl and applied it everywhere my hair attatched to my scalp and extended it out about an inch (so I could blend the next colour in). Then I washed out my tint brush (as I only have one *cries*) and applied the colour in the biggest bowl to my mid lengths, leaving about an inch or so more at the end free of colour and extending it into the eggplant colour at the top, combing the dye through as I worked. Using the final colour I saturated the ends in the dye, making sure I could soak it up as much as I possibly could. I dragged the mid colour into the top of the lilac mix and the lilac mix into the mid length colour so it blended with a smooth transition.

I repeated this throughout each section and once my head was covered, I put on my fashionable Tesco plastic bag and draped the towel from the floor over my shoulders so I could sit around and do nothing for 30 minutes to an hour (feel free to leave it on longer. I would have but didn't have time as I was going out) without dying EVERYTHING. Whilst I was waiting for it to process, I used the wipes to clean my neck, head, face and ears along with any drips on the floor and sink (yes, I am very messy) the best I could. After the time was up I washed it out and towel dried. After 5 minutes of air/towel drying I applied my heat protectant (ALWAYS use heat protectant) and blow dried the ends of my hair so that it didn't drip as much when I went out. SIDENOTE: I always tend to leave my hair to air dry as much as possible after dying just to be nice to it :3

And that was how I did it! When it fades (which I am purposely getting it to do, I am going to redye it the exact same way and this time I want to film it. If I manage to film it and edit it semi-decently I'll post it to here so it's easier to follow than my jibber-jabber, but for now I hope this will do and here's a photo of it in the light *inserts photos*

(The colour timeline of my hair over the week!)

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT a professional at hair or anything. These are my own methods and experiences. Always take care when playing around with your hair, consult your stylist and watch tonnes of videos and read loads of reviews first.

EDIT: After I washed it, it kinda faded out to this (well a bit darker. The direct light and camera quality makes it seem really light. I wish my hair was that colour though <3 maybe one day... *dreams*) *inserts photo* but this was mainly at the front. The back didn't fade as much...hmm weird.