** Click here for Episode 162 **
Enjoy, if you will, the coif conundrum faced by Sophie from Middlesborough:
My mother won’t let me dye my hair bright blue, but at 17 years of age and willing to pay for it myself I think I am well within my rights to dye my hair whatever colour I wish.
She tried telling me I would get fired, but the lady I work for say she was fine with it.
She tried telling me that it would look awful. I pointed out that she says that every time I get my hair done and then a week later she runs off to get the same style.
If what you say is true, maybe she is trying to insinuate that she doesn’t want to have to dye her hair blue next week.
Now she is telling me that the bleach will ruin my hair.
So Helen, answer me this, when I bleach my hair how long should I wait before dying it?
You’re asking the wrong person, dear; the nearest I’ve had to blue hair is when I was bored at school and used to colour strands in with my fountain pen. But I’m sure some of you readers are far more follicularly adventurous, so please go to the comments and tell Sophie the optimal timings for the bleaching and dying so that her scalp doesn’t fall off.
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Answer Me This! Podcast 
January 23, 2011 at 2:28 am |
I had blue hair for a while. Manic Panic, you can still get it via Amazon. You will get attention and you will look like you’re TRYING to get attention. Which, if you’re honest, you have to admit. That will get tedious before the color washes out, so be warned.
January 21, 2011 at 4:10 pm |
I had a very similar problem 12 years ago when I wanted to get my nose pierced.
My mum, understandably, did not want to get my nose pierced.
In the event, I rang my mum up from outside the shop and told her I’d got it done. Once the shrieking was out of the way, I figured the worst was done, and felt sufficiently relaxed to go inside and have sharp metal rammed into my left nostril.
However, twelve years later, and six since I lost my last nose ring, I still can’t breathe properly out of my fucking nose. I don’t think this will be a problem with hair, so go for it. Blue is brilliant.
January 21, 2011 at 10:21 am |
I have blue hair. It looks like this:
Some background about how long the dye lasts, in case it’s useful:
The effect of the dye varies somewhat, and it’s affected by natural hair colour (I’m blonde), and the length of the hair, but I generally need to ‘top it up’ every few weeks. Depending upon the shade of dye, a round of bleach may or may not actually get rid of all of the colour — sometimes I’ll look like an early-1990s Take That reject after the bleach, others I’ll just be left with very white roots and sky blue everywhere else. In practice, for me, the disparity isn’t a problem because I’ve tended to dye it the same colour again, but if I was changing colour it could be a bit of a pain. The bottom line there, basically, is “it depends”.
Now, to actually answer the question.
I use L’oreal’s Prelightener to do the bleaching, and Stargazer dye (which doesn’t contain any ammonia). The bleach takes about 45 minutes for me, but might take longer depending upon hair length. Once I’ve rinsed out the bleach and towel-dried my hair, I apply the dye pretty much straight away, and leave it on for two hours. The critical bit here isn’t how long I wait between bleaching and dying, but ensuing that the bleach has been rinsed out properly — if it’s not been, the dye won’t take properly.
(Also, I find that this particular dye doesn’t work well on freshly-washed hair — I don’t know how universally this might apply, but I try to leave my hair alone for a couple of days before re-dying it).
Hope this helps!
January 19, 2011 at 1:07 pm |
I’ve never dyed my hair either, so instead I’ll try some blatant shilling. A friend of mine is running this site: http://www.rowdydow.co.uk/ and since his hair colour gets changed every few weeks, I’d assume the advice he has on that site is fairly good. He also sells the dyes and bleaches and stuff.
No, I am not on commission. He’s just a lovely chap.