I finally did it. More than 4 years after my ‘Pastel hair trend’ post & Pinterest board I went for it: pastel pink hair! Tomorrowland was just around the corner and I’ve been wanting to do this for the longest time, so when I saw the L’Oréal Colorista range in stores, I knew it was now or never. Because I wasn’t sure how the colour would turn out and wether or not it would suit me, I decided to go for the L’Oréal Colorista Washout version as a first trial. As for colour, I chose the lightest pink available from the line: #PinkHair.
Apart from a wide range of stunning colours he line also offers 3 Colorista effects (Bleach – Ombre – Highlights) which can be used as a base to get your desired effect. Because my hair dyeing skills and experience are literally non-existent and this could be a rather risky experiment, so I decided to rely on my local hairdresser to bleach my hair and then apply the Colorista Washout for me.
Below you can see what my hair looks like naturally – a warm medium brown colour. The look I wanted from the start was an all-over pastel pink, so I had no other option than bleaching my hair all the way, which was an interesting first experience for me. I friggin looked like Legolas from LOTR and new platinum blonde would never be the look for me. But then came the really tricky part…
Let me tell you this: if you have long hair and you want pink all over, you better make sure you have enough tubes of product at hand. And make sure to start from the middle of your hair and work your way up and down. I only had bought one tube for the first dye and my colourist applied it starting from the roots, which resulted into 2 problems: 1) I only had dye for half of my hair and 2) my roots were bright pink aka not at all the look I was going for. Luckily, I managed to cover this up at least a little bit by spraying some of the L’Oréal Professional Hair Touch Up Root Concealer on top to make it look more ‘natural’.
After 2 washes the colours in my lengths were nearly gone and the bright pink in my roots had faded a bit too. The next week I went back with more ammo: 2 tubes of L’Oréal Colorista Washout #PinkHair. This time we started applying more sparingly and didn’t cover the roots. I was super happy with how the colour turned out. Exactly the Sakura pink I wanted! The selfies above illustrate the colour the best. I do have to say some blonde tones were still shining through (see below), but overall it turned out great!
We’re now 2 weeks later and the pink colour has completely disappeared, but it did leave a peachy orange tone instead. Not sure if this is because I bleached it and the product generally tends to hold onto light colours, or if it’s because I dyed it twice in a short period, but everything but my roots is now this shade. L’Oréal does offer a Fader for situations like these but I haven’t tried it yet.
Overall this was a very interesting experiment and in the end I was very happy with the result. It’s a fun way to do something completely different for a certain event or just because.. If you’re already blonde you are in luck, but if you’re not, keep in mind that you might end up with a higher bill than initially planned if you need to buy the Bleach, various tubes of Washout and the Fader afterwards. But it’s better to be safe than sorry. It’s a very eye-catching hair colour after all..
L’Oréal Colorista Effects – € 10
L’Oréal Colorista Washout (80ml) – € 9
L’Oréal Colorista Fader (200ml) – € 9
Exclusively available at Di and Kruidvat (BE).
Disclaimer: Products were purchased.