The Girl Next Door: How to: Purple Hair

How to: Purple Hair

Products I use for my Purple Hair

I have been loyal to Directions Hair Dye for quite a while now as I know how it will react and take to my hair. I used to use Violet and Plum, however, the directions violet made my hair too silver rather than purple so switched to Lavender Crazy Colour mixed with Plum. I left the dye in for 30 minutes and my hair went quite violet in colour. I eventually balanced these colours out. You can see how here. But for now, lets discuss how I dye my hair.

Whenever I dye my hair I like to have some pre-made dye to hand for topping up when I wash my hair in the shower and for when I want a redye every couple of weeks. I mixed this giant bottle of white conditioner from Sainsbury's with 3 teaspoons of Plum and 3 teaspoons of Lavender. I then shook it around.

Top tip: the longer you leave your dye in the conditioner, the darker the colour will be as it stains the white and almost 'develops' the conditioner.

This makes the dye really dark and violet. Squirt a few pumps into your mixing bowl, along with some white conditioner. I would also recommend adding a deep conditioning treatment and Argan Oil to the mix so your hair is beautifully soft afterwards. I use the Mark Hill range as I have found that it not only smells great, but helps maintain soft and healthy hair (very useful when dying or using heat on your hair). The Mark Hill shampoo is gentle, meaning its less likely to strip the colour from my hair. So if the colour is too bright, wash it out gently with the Mark Hill shampoo, alternatively, use any Argan Oil based shampoo as I have found it doesn't bleed out the colour as much as other shampoos.

Using this method, I have maintained violet hair that fades into a silvery blue with purple tints. For a lighter colour, use more conditioner and less dye. Here are some photos freshly dyed and slightly faded:

As most purple dyes are very blue based, the purple WILL fade blue. Mine faded more into a pretty purple into turquoise colour. Depends on the brand and the base colour (cooler or warmer tones in the dye).