The latest colour trends and techniques span the whole spectrum of shades, from ultra-natural looks to super-graphic treatments to bright, bright colours. With best practices and tips from some of the pros, we navigate through it all in this three-part series.
Key looks: colour-blocking, sand art, pixelation
The trend: Creating bright, vivid colours can be a dream for many colourists, but Kandasamy cautions that it’s necessary to approach it with the right attitude: “One of the biggest mistakes is that a lot of stylists want to do things really fast, so they’ll use a high activator to achieve the colour in less time. But what happens is that whatever colour you put on will fade much quicker because you’ve processed and lifted the cuticle so much that you’ve lost flexibility.” If you’re giving your client something bright, “take your time using a low activator, bringing the target shade to the right level slowly.” Lyseng reminds colourists that when “lightening hair with the intention of of creating a cool effect, take the hair one level lighter than needed to avoid a muddy result.”
How to get it: Sand art, an extension of balayage that’s very graphic, takes that entropic idea to a new level by blending complementary colours in a rainbow-like pattern. Pravana guest artist Rebecca Taylor explains the technique of using a zigzagging pattern when applying colour onto pre-lightened hair, creating three-inch sections before blending them into one another for a seamless finish.
Going backwards: While super-pigmented styles are all the rage right now, trends come and go and your client may want to go back to something subtler and more natural. Allard and Kandasamy both say that to colour correct bleached and overprocessed hair, remind your clients that home care is important, too. Allard explains that through her colour correction process, “over-processed hair needs lots of protein to help rebuild the hair’s strength and to prepare it to receive more colour” without breakage. She recommends that as part of any colour correction process, you should fortify stressed strands with an enriching protein treatment.
Images courtesy of Pravana
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