Has anyone gone from blonde to dark and did you like it?

[madamedeluxe]

I have been considering this for ages but my hairdresser is not keen.

I have been having highlights since I was a teenager but find the upkeep really hard. My hair is naturally mousy with hardly any grey so the regrowth is really noticeable and I find it hard to get to the hairdressers sometimes.

I have asked at two different salons and both hairdressers say I would hate it and it would take some time to go blonde again.

Celebrities seem to go from blonde to dark and back again and it always seems to suit them both colours.

Has anyone done this and did it suit you?

Me!

Like you was blonde from being a teenager and got fed up with the up keep. I'm now my natural colour and much prefer. My natural colour is way less mousy than I thought and much warmer with more variations in colour. Way more shiny and healthy looking.

Don't underestimate how long it will take to go natural though. I had to have mine dyed dark initially then had a lot of time of growing it out but it's really worth it.

I've recently had a few lighter blondes put through the ends which I like and there's no upkeep really.

That sounds encouraging. Thanks!

I will be really honest, I know it sounds mad maybe try a darker coloured wig on and really thing if you like it.

The reason the hairdressers are reluctant is probably because of people like me. I tried to go from blonde to my natural hair colour and it was a nightmare. As I bleached my hair, the blonde kept coming back through so they had to go darker than my natural hair colour and I had to keep getting it dyed again and again to stop the blonde showing through. It ended up being an expensive exercise and when I look back, I looked awful, so washed out!
The only upside was that my hair was in fab condition once I stopped bleaching it.

I suppose it depends if you are one of those people who looks good either way or not. I did not look good with darker hair, so have accepted the fact I will have to keep going blonde.

I feel your pain, my roots are so bad, I had to wait it out until next week as I have lots of events going on after that, so wanted to be as blonde as possible for those.

I did it in 20s and loved it. Be mindful of grey though as there's no hiding it when you're dark.
I had barely any but even one hair stands out. Let your highlights grow out a good 2cm and ask your hairdresser to be brutally honest about your grey.
If you're good then do it!

Could you ease yourself in with balayage? Much lower maintenance if you like it and could give you more an idea If you like a darker look.

I did it, although no darker than mid-brown. I liked it at first, but increasingly started to notice that the grey hairs around my temple were much more noticeable with dark hair than blonde. Looking back at photos, my skin looks much more washed out when my hair was darker (I am very fair-skinned). I now use a dark/medium blonde box dye which suits me much better and is very little effort and expense compared to highlights. I had to strip all the brown out of my hair before I could start going blonde again.

Get your hairdresser to put on a darker toner I do that to mine but it doesn't last long it's good to see if you like the change though before committing

I did it, but my hairdresser made me promise I wouldn't change my mind and go back to blonde any time soon.

It's been two years and I've only had to top up the colour twice. She pre pigmented it and then put a deep brown on it which meant I didn't have the blonde coming through.

My hair is now really close to my natural colour with beautiful golden highlights coming through and I love it. But half tempted to have a balayage done to brighten it before summer.

I did it and hated it! Cost me a fortune to get back to what I like!

I’m naturally very blonde - my hair was literally white as a kid. It got slightly darker as I got older, but still very blonde.
I went through a let’s say, “rebellious stage” as a teenager where I bleached parts of my already blonde hair, slapped mental blues/pinks/greens in sections, got bored, bleached it again and shoved another colour on it within a couple of weeks. Obviously that just resulted in extremely damaged, unhealthy hair
Then I joined the army at 16, and hair had to be a “natural colour”. Not necessarily your natural hair colour you were born with, but definitely not blonde with blue and pink raccoon tails So I got a few deep conditioning treatments, and had an all over deep brown colour put on. Continued with the deep conditioning treatments every few weeks, and as a result of that and having my hair constantly tied up and not styled with heat everyday meant that my hair grew to be lovely and healthy in time.
I’ve kept my hair the dark brown ever since!

Oh and before I had the dark brown colour put on, my hair dresser put a red colour on first - she was concerned that I had so much bleach and other shite on my hair, that putting a brown over that would make my hair look very green in certain lights So I walked around for a few days with a head like a fire engine, then had the brown done after

Did it and hted it. Didnt complement my skin colour and I looked washed out and drab. Root growth looked awful too

I did and hated it too.

What I now do is have 3 different colours put in- one of the highlights as my natural colour, one warm blonde and a bleach. It means that when it’s growing out it is not nearly as noticeable because the natural colour blends in.

When dark my face looks a lot older.

Oh dear. Yes I worry about looking older. I tried on a wig and I looked like a witch but it was black and I don’t want to go that dark, more mid-brown.

Those who hated it, how was the process to going blonde again?

I have had my hair every colour under the sun. Naturally a ashy blonde colour. I hate the way blonde hair looks around my face and always end up going back to dark. I typically go blonde so I can dye it teal or pastel pink. I find going from brunette to blonde easy, a few highlights every 6 weeks and you're back to blonde in no time. Personally I prefer dark hair, I think it looks healthier but that's my preference and I prefer dark hair on me.

I did this but I went ombré. I gradually just had less and less highlights and blonde in my hair, and got it cut shorter and shorter until it was all dark.

But now I'm considering dying it because it's much greyer than I had realised.

No I dyed it brown, it lasted 4 weeks, washed out and went ginger. I’m blonde again

I went from bleach blonde to a dark chocolate brown - loved it!

However, when I decided to go back to blonde; I had to have it stripped twice - walked around with slight ginger hair for a week - then had to go back and have it lightened. Took about a month to get an actual blonde.

I did this process ever 6 months going from brown to blonde - ruined my hair and have now settled on a mousey brown to encourage my hair to actually grow and get healthy again

DD did and she looked ill. I blame her emo phase. She now tends to dye her hair red and it suits her a lot more

same here, dark mousey hair colour, had light blonde highlights from my twentys, now 58, and have a apponitment tomorrow for some more highlights, the last time i went was last july, i do put a few through myself with a kit but only on the top. i was going to grow them out but i now feel a bit drab and dull. so having just a few put in tomorrow. i must admit that going so long between highlights my hair is in much better condition. would love to grow them out but just cant.

Hmm still not sure but I might try it as I have been thinking about it for so long.

I have a few times but it fades too quickly back to blonde. Now when I fancy a break from highlights I have a darker root dyed in and leave the blonde through the ends.

I did. It made me look older and my face drained of colour.

I've slowly started to introduce some blonder highlights to lift it and also to reduce the pain of massive and very obvious re-growth you get when you're properly blonde.

I personally wouldn't go darker again.

I did this 8-9 years ago and have no intention of going back to blonde. Hair is mousey naturally but I've been every colour under the sun through the years. I just fancied a change from blonde so told my fantastic hairdresser that I was thinking of going dark and he immediately got out the colour charts!

I am pale with blue eyes and find it actually gives me a bit more colour, although I have to have my eyebrows darkened a bit to look more natural. I have my hair tinted but get my hair done every 6 weeks anyway as it's a short Louise Brooks bob.

I did. My natural colour is dark brown. A few years ago I started going blonde with highlights. It looked great and suited me.
Then my lovely hairdresser left and I decided I wanted to be dark again. So now it's dark purple and magenta with a bit of blue.