Daily outfit: pink lady

I’ve never been one to experiment with hair colour much. I’ve had the odd stripe of colour, courtesy of a box of rinse-out dye in my teenage years. These adventures into the world of hair colour never lasted longer than a single shampoo. I’ve always been very happy with my naturally blonde hair. I adore the way that it has about fifteen different shades woven through it and the way it gleams in the sun. Even though I love my natural hair colour, for years, I’ve toyed with the idea of taking a walk into the world of unnatural hair shades.

I’ve always loved the look of pink hair. It can look rough and punkish or sweet and demure, depending on the shade and style. Ever since Gwen Stefani dyed her trademark platinum locks a brilliant shade of shocking pink, I’ve been tempted to follow suit.

The thought of dyeing my hair scares me more than a little. I’ve always felt a bit frightened that I will botch it up terribly, and that I’ll wind up with a hideous-looking mop of hair. I worry that the dye will wreak havok on my tresses, leaving them dry and brittle. It has also occurred to me that changing your hair colour is, at the very least, a semi-permanent commitment. I’ve never been ready to make that commitment, until now.

Over the weekend, I was playing around with some coloured pigment powders, putting pink stripes into my hair. I really liked the way it looked, and I was disappointed when the colour started to fade after a few hours. I wished that I could get the hue to look more vibrant, and to last longer. An idea was brewing in my brain.

Yesterday, Ross and I took a visit to the local chemist. I spent a long time pouring over the display of hair dyes, trying to settle on exactly the right shade of pink. I admit that I was pretty scared when I realised that all of the pink dyes purported to last between 3 and 30 washes. Gulp! I wasn’t sure that I wanted to change the shade of my hair for that long, but I bit the bullet and bought a tube of Fudge Paintbox dye in Pink Moon.

The tube sat on my bathroom vanity all day. I kept trying to pluck up the courage to start dyeing. At around six, Ross asked me if I really wanted to go through with it. It was at this point that I gave myself a mental shake. “It’s just hair dye”, I told myself, “If you don’t like it, you can just wash it right out”. I figured that the longer I waited to give it a shot, the more scary and daunting the task would seem. The time had come to leap headlong into the unknown.

I decided not to dye my whole head. As I mentioned before, I really do love being a blonde. I just wanted to add a little pop to my regular look. I isolated a fairly thick strand of hair, which was soon to become a pink stripe on a landscape of blonde. I donned a pair of crackly plastic gloves and started gooping the dye onto the strand. The dye was the most shockingly pink shade, and I wondered if I was going to regret my choice. I had already applied it though, and I had reached the point of no return. I squatted in front of the telly for half an hour, with the strand securely wrapped in cling film while it processed. I then headed to the bathroom to wash the dye out.

I have to say that I am pretty happy with the results.

I have to admit, it isn’t as bright as I had hoped it would be. It’s a nice shade to begin with, but I think I need to give it another going-over with the dye to see if I can deepen the colour a bit. I think that part of the problem is that I wussed out and got the lighter pink shade. I should have gotten the brighter formula, but hindsight’s 20-20 I guess. I do like this shade, but I was hoping for something a little more vibrant.

Because my hair is much lighter at the ends, the colour gets brighter towards the tips of my hair. It creates this wierd graduated effect, which I rather like.

This is the outfit I chose to offset my new pink stripe: