Color over Highlights

Q: I recently colored my hair with disastrous results. The color I picked was praline. I choose this color because I wanted to lighten my medium brown hair and highlight at the same time.

It was supposed to make my hair light brown with golden highlights but that is not what I got. I am left with a color only slightly lighter then my original brown and the highlights didn't seem to take evenly.

It seems like the highlights on the top of my head are way too light and the length of my hair is only slightly highlighted. My question is can I color over these highlights and if so do I need to use a color remover for the base color first. Also how long should I wait after the original disaster to try and fix it?

A: You should be able to color over the highlights without using a color remover beforehand. Color removers are generally for seriously over-dyed hair that needs to be stripped of several different layers of color and the color process begun anew.

As long as your hair shows no damage from the process, you should be able to perform a re-color process as soon as you desire. You may want to give yourself a deep conditioning treatment to protect the hair and restore moisture.

If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that the highlights processed unevenly due to the heat from the scalp causing the highlighting color to act more quickly.

When you do the new color, if you plan to include highlights, you should use a foil technique to isolate the sections to be highlighted. Apply the color mix to the center portions of the hair first, between one-to-two inches from the scalp to two-to-three inches from the ends. After 10 minutes, apply he color mix at the scalp area and pull the color through the ends of the hair.

Be sure to review our articles on hair coloring and foil highlighting techniques.

©Hairfinder.com

See also:

Highlights

Foil highlighting