Before my hairdressing career began, I often experimented with box dyes (I was young and "carefree" don't judge me). On one horrific occasion, I attempted to dye my hair dark brown. HUGE mistake. It looked awful and not a single person was afraid to tell me this. I didn't understand why my best friend looked so beautiful with dark hair but for me (a natural blonde) it made me look almost ill! It cost me about £200 to fix so that's when the experimenting stopped.
I understood that the colour just didn't suit me, but I didn't understand why. Of course, as with all things fashion, there is an element of taste when choosing your next hair colour, but if you're not sure what will suit you, there are a few simple rules you can follow.
1. Are you Light, Medium or Dark?
Lets assess! If your hair is blonde then it is "light". if it is dark blonde to brown it is "medium". And if your hair is brown to black hair it is "dark".
Now asses your own skin tone and eye colour, and categorise yourself into light, medium or dark.
If all of your colouring sits in the same category then you are what hairdressers call a "blend client" so when considering your hair colour, you should ideally stay within this category, or at least within 3 shades lighter or darker. Here's an example: Halle Berry's natural features all fall into the dark category, making her a blend client. Most would agree the darker hair colour in the right image is a better look. She still has some lightness but away from her face and very soft so it works.
Alternatively let's look at the gorgeous Reece Witherspoon. All her features fall into the "light" category, so blonde is gorgeous on her, the light brown works really well, because her stylist has left some lightness around her face Frame. The darker colour seems to wash her out a bit more, and she's had to darken up her eye make up just to make this look work.
If your hair colour sits in another category to your eye or skin tone, then you are a "contrast client". This means you have more options in terms of hair colour suitability, Take poster Rhianna for example. Her natural hair colour is dark, her skin tone is dark but her eye colour is light. She famously changes her hair colour and seems to be able to pull of anything!
2. Are you Warm or Cool?
This is simple, if you have a warm skin tone, you should keep your hair colour warm. If you have a cool skin tone, you should keep your hair colour cool. if you don't know the answer to this then no worries, most people don't! However, miss matching your skin tone will not only suit you less, but it could also draw out your flaws! Ash tones always make me look tired!
Take Megan Fox as an example. In the first two images, even though the colours are so different, both work because they're cool, The last image she has a warmer more brassy colour, she still looks amazing but most would agree the cooler colours suit her more.
So how can you tell if you're warm or cool?
There are a few ways of finding out.
Use gold or silver:
Use a colour cape:
Ask a professional:
Of course, don't fret if you find out the colour you want might not suit you, there are lots of clever tricks we can do to tweak the colour to make it work. This is the difference between seeing a professional or using a box dye.
Also, preference is everything. If you want a certain colour, just go for it,