Home Hair Care: Color Treated Hair

Color Treated Hair is hair that has been altered by hair color, whether it's a permanent color, demi-permanent color, temporary color, or highlights. Due to chemical changes, hair needs to be treated a little differently than natural hair.

Fade prevention: When you spend money on your hair color, you want it to last! Here's a list of ways to slow color fading
     *use color safe shampoo - any shampoo can claim to be color safe, avoid the following ingredients:
            - Sodium Laurel Sulfate 
            - Sodium Chloride (salt) 
     *avoid direct sunlight (wear a hat when you're at the beach or spending a long time in the sun)
     *try to shampoo and getting your hair wet less often (each time you shampoo, some of those color molecules fall out of the hair slowly changing the tone)


Highlighted hair: The chemical process that happens to the hair during a highlight service causes the hair to expand, and the hair looses some proteins in the process. It's ideal to use a 'repairative' mask or conditioner at least once a week. This will strengthen the hair and prevent breakage. 
If you have gone blonde, and feel like your hair looks a little brassy between touch ups, use a purple shampoo when needed. The purple shampoo will cancel out any unwanted tones and brighten your highlights! Let the purple shampoo set on the hair for a few minutes, then rinse. Usually the brassiness is gone with one shampoo, after that return to your normal color-safe shampoo.

My favorite product line for color-treated locks is ColorProof! The entire line is designed to protect your beautiful color! It is also 100% vegan, free of all known carcinogens, and has many options for all hair types.   

How To: Blow Drying with a Round Brush

Blow drying with a round brush is the foundation of creating a great hairstyle. It provides volume and helps smooth the hair. When the hair is blow dried correctly, you won't have to flat iron as much!

The products I like to use are ColorProof's LiftIt Foam Mousse and Control Craze Styling Creme. This provides a clean lift and weightless hold!  

After applying the products, blow dry the hair until it's about 80% dry. You don't need the brush for this part yet. The goal is just to get the hair mostly dry. You may hold your head upside down to get added volume. If your hair tangles easily, avoid giving you hair a rough blow dry, try going in only one direction with the blow dryer. 

Once your hair is mostly dry, it's time to take out your clip and round brush! My favorite round brushes are by Olivia Garden. It's important to have a quality blow dryer. This FHI Heat gives of a good bit of power behind it's air stream so you will dry the hair faster and smoother. If your dryer is going bad, it may be giving you just damaging heat instead.  

Clip most of you hair up, leaving the back, bottom section out. This will be the first section. Gently spin the round brush as it's close to your scalp while you dry it. This is what you the most volume! Pull the brush up, and out of the hair lengths as you run the hot air over it. 

Continue this pattern around the head, making 'horseshoe' shaped sections. The sections should be as thick as the diameter of the round brush. So, if the circle of your round brush is 2 inches, your sections would be 2 inches thick. Remember to spin the round brush a little bit at the roots. Once you get to the top, section out the 'mohawk' section. This is the top section of the head, which should include your part. This section is done just a little differently than the rest. 

Round brush this section of hair straight up, pulling it slightly forward to create the most volume. Once you get to the ends, spin the round brush just a little more! 

For the fringe area, blow dry the hair down and forward. This will help fight cowlicks, and you will be able to brush your bangs to either side. 

If you struggle with a tough cowlick in the front, it's best to blow dry that section first. Blow dry creating an 'X' pattern with brush and dryer. Blow dry one direction, then the next.  

Practice makes perfect! Once you get used to working with these tools, it will get easier for you! This is the hair styled with only the blow dryer and round brush, no flat irons or curling irons! 

More Tips:
     *When you're done blow drying, turn you blow dryer on the cool setting, and blast the hair with cool air. This helps shut down the cuticle, holds the style, and makes your hair shiny!
     *It's helpful to have the concentrator nozzle on your hair dryer. It directs the heat right where you want it, speeding up blow drying time.

How To: Outer Barrel Curls

The Outer Barrel Curling Method is great if you have a hard time using a curling iron and get those 'crease' marks. This method creates a soft curl, and is super easy to do at home. Always use caution when working with heat tools, and be sure to use a heat protectant on your hair. 
One of my favorites is ColorProof's Heat Proof.


Your curling iron probably looks like this.. and you would normally wrap your hair on the inside of the iron. But, with this method, it stays closed and you wrap the hair around the outside of the iron. You can also use a curling wand for this.




Begin by sectioning your hair. Sectioning you hair provides you with more control, and helps you put the curls right where you want them! If you have thicker hair, take smaller sections, if you have finer hair take larger sections. The sections should start at the nape. (the back, bottom part of your head) Work your way up the head, making a new section each time.


Then, starting with the iron in the middle of the hair section, begin wrapping the hair around the iron. You may hold the iron vertically or horizontally. If you want the curls to be consistant, stick with one way, if you want a variety, alternate between the two. Don't overlap the hair as you are wrapping the section around the iron, you want the hair to have an even amount of heat. I always leave about a half inch of hair on the ends off the iron when I wrap it this way, just so I don't burn myself.




The finished look! In this picture, I used a 1" barrel curling iron and used vertical wrapping sections. Also, I combed my fingers through it.

Side Notes:
*The smaller the curling iron is, the tighter the curl will be.
*Avoid touching the hair right after it has been curled. Wait for the hair to cool before adjusting pieces of combing through it. Touching the hair before it has had time to cool can make the curls fall out!
*If you hair has a hard time holding a curl, lightly spray each section with 'working' hairspray. This is a light hold hair spray that can be brushed out with ease. That helps set the hair on the curl.