What does everyone think of grey hair?

[SilverDoublet]

Over the last 2 years I grew out my hair, it's quite grey but I just couldn't handle the regrowth reappearing every 3 weeks and didn't have time or money to deal with it. My hair was quite dark so I had been dying it dark brown. But now it's pure white in places, salt and pepper on top and still dark underneath. I asked a hair dresser if I should go blonde to hide regrowth but she said Im too dark. And I can't stand the regrowth with brunette. What do people think of grey? Or what does everyone else with hair like this do? I'm 45, don't like looking so old...

I think you look great and your hair complements your skin and love that colour lipstick on you.

I think there is a danger of looking tired ans washed out. My hair is now silvery grey and I wear much more dramatic lip colours than I used to when my hair was very dark.

The fact remains that plenty of people have grey hair much younger than you deem to be socially acceptable.

I think naturally grey hair on someone young is frequently absolutely stunning because it is unexpected.

And your snide little edited in extra paragraph makes you sound really quite unkind.

A friend dyed her hair dark brown for years, before I knew her. She stopped dyeing it grey over the past few years and if i am honest, has aged her quite a bit. She's late 30s and I would say if I didnt know her age, I would guess she was lare 40s.

She looks young facially and is very bright, bubbly and fun, so the grey doesn't age her in that sense. I love her as a friend however she looks. 🥰

If you read all the pro-grey comments together then all the anti-grey comments together there's a real difference in the tone, with the latter generally coming across as far less considered, articulate or kind. You can start to see why they're so invested in their looks - likely not a lot else going on.

I'm genuinely curious, so what happens when one turns 60 that suddenly makes grey hair look good? Will you be able to stop dying your hair in 5 years then?
Maybe it's just that people retire in their 60s and don't have the funds to continue to dye it on a pension anymore, so you've got used to seeing women in their 60s with undyed hair.

I’m getting my roots done tomorrow! Cannot wait!
My nan stopped doing her roots at 88 only when she become immobile 😢. I will certainly let follow her path and only stop when physically unable.

....maybe because they're too busy dying their hair 🤐😂
That is one thing that made me loathe dying my hair, the absolute futility and time wastage of the whole exercise. And for what.... The colour never looked quite right, either stained skin, or too dark or else orangey brown with white roots that people would look at while talking to me, and a load of hair clogging the drain. Roots in 3 weeks... My hair is thicker since I stopped.

This poster also says that the cut off point for long hair is 60, so although oldish herself, she clearly has very strong opinions about how over 60's should look.

I've got grey streaks in long hair over 60, but I never was one for doing what I'm told.

@SilverDoublet I actually take my laptop with me to get my roots done. And if you go to the right hairdresser the results are great. It’s trail and error. It’s a personal preference whether to die or grow grey, we all chose what’s right for us

Haha dye, not die 💀 my typo.

I'm 52 and brunette but going on my temples and get the odd bit at the front, tried embracing it but it just makes me look old and tired. I have lots of chunky blond highlights stuck in every few months to disguise it.

Yes there is a man that moved into a house on our road a few years ago. He has a younger wife and a baby. Whenever I see him I think 'there's the old man with the weird dyed hair...' For some reason he's dying it that orangey brown colour and it just looks so odd.

The thing is it's completely obvious that it's dyed.... I have a lot too, also mid 40s, I just didn't have the time or inclination to fight that losing battle anymore. I got offered a new job with this grey hair so it can't be that bad. There are 2 other new grey haired female staff too, and they look great.

It's not just about preconditioning. Some women look good grey and some don't.

As the late Nora Ephron wrote:

"There's a reason why forty, fifty, and sixty don't look the way they used to, and it's not because of feminism, or better living through exercise. It's because of hair dye. In the 1950's only 7 percent of American women dyed their hair; today there are parts of Manhattan and Los Angeles where there are no gray-haired women at all."

Grey can look absolutely stunning—especially when it's intentional and well cared for. At 45, embracing your natural grey isn’t “giving up,” it’s just another style choice—and many find it liberating.

You’ve already done the hard part by growing it out! If you don’t like how the salt-and-pepper/dark underneath looks, a good colourist can blend the tones with silver lowlights or toner to make it look more cohesive and stylish.

If you’re not ready to go fully grey, you could try a cool ash brown or mushroom brown—softer than dark brunette, blends regrowth better, and doesn’t fight the grey as hard.

Bottom line: grey isn’t ageing—it’s how it’s styled. A modern cut and healthy shine make all the difference.

This is an interesting thread. I am in the process of growing my colour out (early 50s) because I have started swimming again and the chlorine has made brown a kind of dark orange red brown, which I don’t like. Plus, I am curious to know what my natural colour looks like.

I do think colour looks false the older you get, which is not to say that it cannot look good. But it is expense and time to keep it looking good. The scene which sticks in my mind is once I was out for lunch and there were a table of women who must have been in their fifties. All but one, and there were about eight, had coloured hair of various sorts. The other woman had a grey natural longish bob and she looked by far the most stunning. Like, literally eye-catching. She was wearing a dark red lipstick and her hair was quite a dark grey and in great condition. It did just make me think that natural can look amazing and it totally threw the falseness of the colour into relief.

Not saying that my natural hair will look amazing but it cannot look worse than my current orange and I want to keep swimming.

How do you all have the patience to grow it out? The patchy stage is so annoying. I have raven black hair so the grey is very visible.
Maybe I should get a good colourist.

Does anyone dye it all grey first and then let it grown out? If so I may go for that approach one day as I don’t like the growing out any colour look?

I don't think there's any definitive answer, because we all grey at different rates, just as our hair grows at different rates

With me it's been very gradual, just the odd silver thread underneath and at the temples to begin with, but now threaded through on the top. It's almost like someone got a silver pen and drew a few fine lines down the length of my hair.

When you've dyed it is definitely more difficult to let the grey grow in, and that's where I'm sure a good colourist can help.

I got very fine highlights all over at first, which to be honest, didn’t particularly suit me as I’m not a blonde person, but it it helped lighten it overall and it was manageable. Here’s a pic of it when the grey is nearly half way down. I’ve covered my face as I had an acne flare at the time. Also, it doesn’t look particularly shiny here but it was..think it was just the light. It always looks shiny in daylight.

It’s definitely a painful process. My natural hair is very dark and I used to colour it. After two weeks you could clearly see the grey roots and as I lived in the far east it was hard to avoid the orange colour if I went out without a hat. I waited until I had about 3 cm of grey and then my hairdresser cut everything that wasn’t grey off - a bit radical but worked for me. It’s now longer than when I used to dye it and a silvery grey.

Gosh there are some viscious anti grey comments on here. I can't say I've noticed it making people look older. The people I know with grey hair suit it. I was lucky in that my mum 'embraced the grey' decades before it was even a thing. She has lovely silver hair and looked great with it - she must have been mid to late 40s??

I'm finding hair dye doesn't look great on me as I age, maybe my hair has changed because dying it brown (either from a box or in the hairdressers) seems to result in the colour fading and looking orangey quite quickly. Blonde is the same, despite using purple shampoo it looks brassy and frazzled. My hairdresser has put toner and silvery highlights on it now so I can grow in my natural salt and pepper. I like it. I have a really nice white streak at my temples too.

I'm glad you feel empowered by grey hair, I don't. My 90yr old Grandma has only a smattering of grey in her dark hair, my Mum has had thick silver hair for years. Luck of the draw that I've followed my Mum. I started going grey at 19 so it's been a long and expensive slog so far of covering them. I'm also dark so they are very obvious. I have highlights and balayage so whilst it's blended and as sunkissed/ natural as possible I'm aware my hair looks dyed, I don't mind that though. It's all personal preference.