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Prepare to dye!
So about a month ago I posted about part of the price that I pay for my goth goddess status - namely, the need to faff around with black hair dye! Since then I have had no opportunity to do more to my hair than keep it clean and brushed, meaning that every break on my work-at-home day today is spoken for.
For the sake of any hair dye virgins out there, this is what I do to get ready for coating my head in the black stuff:
- Firstly I wash my hair with a build-up remover shampoo. These can get quite fancy but they don’t need to be - Boots Expert does the job, is cheap and smells nice. It also strips off a fair bit of existing dye so should only be used before adding new dye.
- The instructions on the dye always say not to use conditioner. With my hair this is akin to telling me to stick my head in a knitting machine! So I condition thoroughly before shampooing, then use a small amount afterwards, combing it through each time. A basic non-plasticising minimally-coating conditioner is good here, luckily these tend to be the cheap storebrand ones (Co-op in my case)
- Oh, and if you’re doing the whole thing in one day and your heating and hot water are on pay as you go, prime up the meter before starting! You will use hot water. Your hair will be wet, your towels (which you’ll want to use again) will be wet, your clothes will be wet, and it is nearly sodding December so radiators will be needed.
- Then I blowdry my hair, with a normal dryer and brush rather than the hot brush since the purpose is just to get it dry and stop it knotting up.
- This is where I moisturise like a bastard - face, neck and hands. If your skin has just absorbed moisturiser it is less likely to want to absorb dye. You do not want it to absorb the dye! On my face and neck I use a coat of night cream - which gets absorbed more thoroughly - then a coat of day cream which provides a barrier. On my hands I use a hand and nail cream, which has the added bonus of protecting the said parts of my anatomy from the ravages of hot water and shampoo.
- Then I glove up, put the black stuff on and get down to some marking while it does its thing! Off to do that now…
