Lush Henna for a Tenner

[CuntyBunty]

Have you? Would you?

They have bright Sunset red and for £10 they will do it in the shop for you. Apparently it is permanent, but does fade. This last bit is important, because I dont want to be a slave to hair dye. I have mid length auburn hair and need to funk it up a bit before I let it turn white. I am getting a few white stands in the middle of my fringe, which I am excited about; I quite fancy a Cruella streak.

Has anyone any experience of this henna? Please?

I have very dark hair and lots of whites and have used henna from various places including Lush. Their stuff is ok (despite all the crap they add to it) and it doesn't contain sodium picramate which is in a lot of box hennas and a) damages rather than strengthens hair and b) reacts badly to chemical dyes used later.

I've used chemical dyes over henna, BTW, with no problems, but I'm working with very dark hair to begin with.

To use henna you have to do a lot of research (Henna for Hair is a great site). Be a real nerd. It IS permanent. It CAN turn out or fade to orange. Reapply it too many times and you get aubergine instead of auburn. So, read up and be aware of the pitfalls! It can be an amazing product and it does strengthen your hair, used correctly. But.

I have a block of the red/brown one. It's good henna. What I like about it it is that I can grate off what I need and the rest keeps. I only use it occasionally for some greys in my fringe. And yes it does fade nicely, it also covers the grey well. Mine turned into a sort of brown red and blended in with my dark brown hair well. They weren't all one block colour either, so looked much more natural.

I used to use the chestnut brown/red one, back when I had long hair. It doesn't totally fade out, & you can't use chemical hair dyes over hair that's been coloured with henna, you have to wait for it all to grow out. The blocks were messy to put on (chop up, mix with hot water, leave to cool a bit, apply while still fairly warm). It drips, a lot, & you've got to leave it on for quite a while (I used to leave it for 4 hours). If you get it on fabric it doesn't come out - ever! I used to have a black pillow case for the first few nights after I'd done it each time.

But, the colour, especially when freshly done, is vibrant & gorgeous. It really does make your hair feel a hell of a lot thicker. It's not got lots of nasty chemicals in, so less likely to cause am allergic reaction, & if you are allergic it's less likely to have major side effects than conventional dye.

You need to think about it properly before you do it. If you don't like the colour, you can mix the different colours up. But if you don't like the dye or inconvenience, you're stuck with it till it's grown out. Personally I loved it, but it's totally impractical for me now (can't have a toddler leaping all over me for 4 hours while the dye does it's thing, dripping all the while.)

I used to use Lush Henna,it makes you hair thicker (because it's coated) and the colours are quite nice.It does fade well although that can lead to colour change.

You CAN dye over it with chemical dye,I did!But I waited a month or so after my last use of it.You have to be careful with dying over Henna,so always strand test.

I believe it isn't pure henna either so not so bad for dying over