If you've decided to go down the route of having lighter coloured hair, You'll often find that bleach is required to lift your hair from your natural tone, to that lighter colour that you've asked for. It isn't always the case that bleach is required as there are a few colours that do lift as well, It's just in most cases, bleach will be required.
It's important to understand that bleach is an oxidizing agent that has the capability to open up the hair cuticle and dissolve the hairs natural melanin (natural pigmentation). It's important to understand that those unwanted orange tones in the hair is primarily down to the hairs natural melanin being broken down by bleach, Even if the hair doesn't look orange straight away, after a few washes, you may start to find orange and brassy tones appearing. This is completely normal.
What Causes Your Hair To Go Orange?
When you strip melanin from the hair through the bleaching process, the underlying pigments in the cuticle are revealed. In darker coloured hair, this can often result in an orange / brassy colour. It's a common occurrence with bleaching the hair but can also be caused by other environmental factors.
When you're actually in the process of getting your hair done, Unwanted orange and brassy tones can be surprisingly natural. Once the hair has had an oxidising agent applied to it, it will ultimately dilute the melanin that is present in within the hair cuticle. If you've read our guide on hair colour theory, you'll know that melanin is responsible for the lightness or darkness of your natural hair colour as well as the actual colour shade itself.
When we're lightening the hair, Particularly from a darker colour, the underlying pigments can become orange or yellow, Particularly after the first lightening session. You may have heard many hairdressers say things along the lines of "Trust The Process", If you're having your hair bleached, They may be referring to something they have said earlier in the consultation on the process they're going to use to get you to your desired colour.
It may in fact not be possible to reach your desired hair colour within one sitting. This may be for various reasons such as condition of the hair, the current shade of the hair or potentially damage that may be caused. So the process the colour technician may be taking, may be to gradually lighten the hair over several appointments, going a shade lighter each time and leaving you with a desirable colour each time, rather than lifting as much as possible in one sitting and potentially leaving you with patchy, damaged, yellow and orange hair... It's not a look anybody wants.
How To Get Rid of Orange Hair
If you feel that your hair is really begging to go orange but aren't quite ready to book another bleaching session yet, or you've not long had one, then you can always look to using a good blue or purple shampoo, there are many different brands with varying pigmentation intensity and some of them are absolute miracle cures.
Fanola No Orange Hair Mask
Currently, We're personally using the Fanola products and what you're looking at here is the Fanola No Orange Hair Mask. This hair mask helps to remove unwanted copper tones within the hair and is also suitable for colour treated hair.
We've personally found the Fanola products to be incredible value for money and very heavily pigmented. Especially in comparison to some of the drug store shampoos.
How Does Blue Shampoo & Blue Hair Masks Work?
When neutralizing yellow/brassy/orange tones in the hair, we always go with a blue/purple pigmented product, such as a blue shampoo, or blue hair mask. This is because blue is opposite orange on the colour wheel, meaning it will neutralize that colour. You've all seen the viral tiktok toothpaste commercial. It's exactly the same concept. You can read more about colour theory here though if you'd like to learn more.
