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Hi! Hope you're all doing as well as can be ? obviously the quarantine has gotten to me as I've embarked on a journey to go from a natural darker brown to pastel purple. I would love your advice and or commiseration with what you're going to see haha
Two weeks ago I lightened virgin hair using Wella Colorcharm and 30 volume Salon Care developer. I did two rounds of bleach (sloppy 40-50 min) scorched my scalp the tiniest bit and called it quits until I was healed up nicely. Successfully got quite a bit lighter but the job was patchy and I had super white roots (my helper/friend was heavy as handed on bleaching my roots as I was pouring our wine ?).
So I waited two weeks, washing my hair as infrequently as possible and leaving conditioner in for 10-15 each time. I stress tested with no rubber band effect nor breakage. I did a strand test to make sure the bleach didn't sizzle anything and proceeded to hit the whole thing again (this time avoiding the roots til the last few minutes). Round 3 of bleach successfully got rid of the orange but I still had a lot of yellow specifically in the top and mids. My SO also had to spot bleach some roots I missed in my blind spots ?. I did a keratin mask and let everything air dry.
That's about as careful as my patience was willing to allow. After much texting w my bff (who would be the best person to help but now lives a state away) I decided to do a bleach bath to try to once and for all knock out the yellow and even up some of the banding that I noticed. I mixed the lightener and developer per usual and doubled the total volume w shampoo. It lightened and evened a touch but the yellow stuck around.
In lieu of futzing with anymore bleach I moved on to toning in hopes that the yellow was light enough to be nuetralized. Enter Ion Platinum Lace toner and the matching Sensitive Scalp 10 Vol creme developer. All that did for me was make the white white hair kinda grey and the yellowy hair a ... well... yellowy grey. ?
At this point I just wanted to apologize to my hair by drenching it in color + conditioner and be done with it. So I soldiered on with mixing up 2oz conditioner to a few drops of Arctic Fox's Girls Night and Purple Rain. Pro tip: don't be like me and use a blue shampoo when attempting to actually know what color you're mixing.
At the end of it all I have great color at the roots and ends and underside of my hair but I've got a veil of yellowish wanna be purple hair politely covering it all unless I brush my hair back. So I came here hoping to get advice on the following points:
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What colors would actually cover this wild a$$ yellow so I can have something passable while I repair my hair before any future mad scientist projects. I did also buy Arctic Fox's teal and hot pink
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If I ride this out 2-4 weeks and decide to try and lighten the yellow hair do I need to bleach bath with a lower vol developer before bleaching like regular? The yellow is so stubborn y'all. It survived 3 bleaches, a bleach bath, and toning+dyeing.
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How would you handle sectioning out the yellow veil of hair as it's all over. It's like a shell of bad color hiding the actually decent looking part ?
I'm down to wait a while before experimenting further. I was looking into getting olaplex 3 and using the Ion version of olaplex 1 (Ion Absolue Perfectuon Booster Step 1) if I do bleach again. My hair still holds up to the tug test (no breakage) but I definitely feel the slight texture change and don't want to push my luck too badly. I feel fortunate that I haven't burned or lost any hair at this point and if it did go awry id be fine going to a pixie again. Would love to hear how some of you more experienced folks would move forward with this situation.
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Starting color - virgin hair
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Top left - bleach 1, top right - bleach 2, bottom left - bleach 3, bottom right - post toner
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Post coloring, don't let the photo fool you it's not pink but a sad yellow grey
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So to start, I'm not sure I'd fully recommend lightening again, mainly because I have personally found that about three processes is all that my hair can take before getting fried. Bond builders and protein can definitely make you hair look and feel better, but they don't do enough to let your hair withstand an extra bleach process. The bonds that Olaplex and similar products form are not the same strength as the regular disulphide bonds in your hair, so you do still need to treat them with care. It's like if you smashed a teapot and then glued it back together. It might have the same general structure, but it's going to be more fragile.
To me, the problem seems to be mainly a saturation issue on the yellower parts. You might've benefitted from using less developer so you can really brush it on thick and made. Of course, some bleach just doesn't have enough lift to get over the hump of the yellow, but application does matter too. My hair is a bit darker than yours and I can usually get to the a level 10 (similar to the lightest areas if your second photo) with two processes with Matrix Light Master or Schwarzkopf BlondMe or the Ion Bright White Lightener for 60 minutes. However, I can need to use a lot of product, apply to very thin section (2-3 strand wide) and cover it and then put a beanie over it so it stays warm. My hair is also a bit shorter than yours, so for you, you might've needed some heat.
Anyhow, as for what you could do now, the yellow isn't actually too bad if you don't do pastel shades. Lavender happens to be a particularly unforgiving colour, because it will partially tone your hair. The lightest sections will get tinted purple or white and the darkest sections will looks peachy, pink, yellow, or orange. The mix of warm and cool tones makes the unevenness stand out more. If you go to a mid-toned purple, it won't look 100% even, but it'll just be varying tones of the same colour. Teal and hot pink are also quite forgiving, so that's also an option. I will say, though, I personally don't love Arctic Fox dyes as I don't find them very pigmented and I think they can look patchy and fade unevenly, but I think it's fine to use what you have on hand. I will say, Girl's Night is almost just a conditioner with how little pigment it has, so I wouldn't use too much of it as it will really dilute the colour.
One other option to consider is doing multiple colours. You could do streaks or a teal, blue, purple, and pink peacock gradient. If you mix or overlap the purple and the teal, it should make a blue. I love this colour combo and have done it many times. It's nice because the placement can also help hide unevenness in the base.
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