Highlights: Adding Depth and Concealing Gray Hairs
Highlights can add depth to your hair and help conceal gray hair. They can also help slim down your face and accentuate eye colors. Different techniques, such as highlighting kits, balayage, or foil, can be used to dye highlights.
Foil Highlights: Fast and Damage Minimizing
Foil highlights involve using strips of aluminum foil to trap heat and speed up the coloring process. This technique helps minimize damage to your hair.
Tips for Getting Suitable Highlights
When choosing highlights, consider your skin tone and undertones. More astonishing highlights, like silver, ash, or beige, work well for cool-toned individuals. Warm-toned individuals can opt for warmer highlights like golden caramel or honey. It’s essential to consult an experienced colorist to find the ideal shade combination for your complexion.
Avoid going too light with the hue when getting highlights, as it can create an unnatural stripy effect. Aim for highlights that are one to two levels more delicate than your base color to prevent fading with sun exposure and regular washing.
Before getting highlights, it’s recommended to get a haircut. This allows your stylist to assess where the highlights should go during the cut.
Alternative Technique: Balayage
Balayage is a hand-painted technique that creates a natural-looking ombre effect. It requires high skill levels and should be performed by an experienced hair colorist.
DIY Hair Highlighting
Invest in a highlighting kit with small metal hooks if you want to highlight your hair at home. Ensure to brush and detangle your locks before applying the dye according to the instructions provided. Rinse out the stain, towel dry, and add toner as necessary.
How to Get Highlights on the Tips of Your Hair
Your stylist can use various techniques to physically highlight your hair, such as foils, balayage, or hand-painting. However, achieving professional-level results at home takes time and effort.
Foil Highlights: Precise and Non-Bleeding
Foil highlights provide precision-colored highlights without bleeding into your natural hair color. Your stylist wraps sections of hair in aluminum foil strips, keeping them separated while applying the highlights.
Choosing Highlight Colors
When selecting highlight colors, consider both your skin tone and undertones. More astonishing highlights work best for calm, ashy skin tones, while warmer hues suit warmer complexions. Ensure that the highlight hue matches your base color to avoid mismatched results.
Avoid going more than two levels lighter than your base color, as it can appear harsh and stripy. If lightening at home, follow the instructions carefully to avoid over-highlighting, as excessively lightened hair may look unsophisticated and flat.
Troubleshooting and Maintenance
If your highlights don’t meet your expectations, you can touch them up using gloss or toner to brighten and soften the contrast with dark roots. A quality hair mask will also help keep your locks strong and healthy between touch-ups.
