You just came back from the salon after spending half a day and a few hundred dollars. You invested your time and money into your hair at the salon, but it shouldn’t stop there. So why is hair care so important for colored hair? The products, tools, and your hair care routine play a huge role in the weeks following a color service.
Just think of it this way, if you bought a Cashmere sweater the care is different from a regular t-shirt. Investment in dyed hair care is very similar. These are the easy steps that will help you protect your hair and keep the beautiful color for longer.
How to Protect Dyed Hair Health and Color
When it comes to color-treated hair, there are two major goals to follow. First, you want to restore the health of your hair that might be compromised due to the color service, especially if it involved bleaching your strands. Second, you want to prevent or delay hair color fading for as long as possible. These tips will help in both cases!
1. Wash Your Hair Less
Let’s start with hair washing. There isn’t a specific guideline to how often one should wash their hair, but washing your hair too frequently can cause damage. It strips natural oils and eventually makes the hair dry and brittle, frizzy and dull, and can even cause irritation on the scalp. If you’ve had your hair colored, and your color is fading fast, you may be washing your hair too much.
Your water also matters when it comes to your hair care regime. Hard water or well water is full of minerals and salts that can cause hair color to fade faster. The metals in the hard water can prevent your hair care products from doing their job. City water tends to have higher alkaline levels which can also fade hair color. Water softeners are a great way to help protect the hair from premature fading and mineral build-up.
2. Intest in the Right Shampoo and Conditioner
Shampoos and conditioners are a very important part of your hair care. There’s a reason your stylist is recommending professional hair care products versus products you can pick up at your local grocery store. Professional hair care products aren’t just better because of the high-quality ingredients they contain but also for the ingredients they don’t contain. They may make your hair look shiny and feel amazing at first but can leave damaging long-term effects on your hair.
Some of the ingredients that can harm your hair are silicones, parabens, and sodium chloride. Unfortunately, a lot of drugstore shampoos use these ingredients. Salon shampoos are made with very little or none of the ingredients and use more ingredients to keep your hair and scalp healthy.
- Silicones are meant to lock in moisture, prevent frizz and make the hair look and feel shiny. It can also keep the good ingredients out, though. A silicon build-up from shampoo can lead to brittle, dull, and dry hair.
- Parabens are chemicals that are used to preserve products like shampoos and conditioners. Parabens absorb easily into the skin and can be harmful to your scalp. They can also cause allergic reactions or irritate any existing skin conditions.
- Sodium chloride, also known as table salt, is often used as a thickening ingredient in hair products, and it can rapidly fade hair color and make a sensitive scalp dry and itchy. It can even go as far as hair loss. Unfortunately, it’s still one of the top ingredients in drugstore shampoos.
Investing in your shampoos and conditioners is very important to preserve the vibrant hair color and keep your hair healthy, so make sure you purchase recommended hair care from a licensed professional.
3. Turn Down the Heat
Heat or thermal styling is styling hair with tools that use heat like hair dryers, hair dry brushes, flat irons, and curling irons. Heat styling tools are a staple in a lot of our hair routines but, if not used properly, they can also wreak havoc on the hair, as too high temperature on dyed locks can cause color fading and breakage.
It is extremely important to purchase heat tools with an adjustable temperature. Whether it comes to blow-drying or using flat irons and curling irons, you should never be using hot tools at full heat and without a heat protectant!
4. Cater to Specific Color and Hair Type Needs
Hair care for different types of color services varies. For vivid colors, it’s recommended not to wash hair for at least 3-4 days after the coloring service, then – once or two times per week. To keep the vivid hair dye bright and luscious, wash it in cold water with a color-protectant shampoo and use as least amount of heat as possible.
Bleached hair can be delicate and dry, so it is best to rotate moisture and protein shampoos and conditioners. Adding bond-building products to the hair care regime to rebuild and strengthen the hair after a bleaching service can really make a difference as well. Of course, you should also follow any recommendations of your stylist regarding the use of purple shampoo to keep your shade cool and brass-free.
Colored curly hair requires a quality, sulfate-free shampoo, a moisturizing conditioner, regular deep treatments, and leave-in conditioners to replenish moisture in between washes and keep color-treated hair moisturized.
5. Plan for Extra Care in Summer
Maintaining your hair color during the summer can be challenging with factors like excessive sun exposure, chlorine, and salt water. To keep your colored hair vibrant for longer, start using a hydrating treatment immediately after your color service. Adding a glossing between color appointments will also help keep hair color its freshest.
To keep dyed hair healthy, change up your conditioner to a moisturizing hair mask to hydrate your locks during the summer. Just like we need to protect our skin during the summer, we need to provide UV protection for our hair. Using dedicated products and wearing a hat will not only protect your skin, but it will also protect your color from fading during those long times of sun exposure too.
Need more hacks to prevent color fading? Soaking your hair with fresh water and adding a leave-in conditioner before you go for a swim will hopefully create a barrier to avoid it from sucking up the salt or chlorine. After swimming, use a clarifying shampoo to gently rid the salt and chlorine from the hair.
Following these tips for colored treated hair, you can maintain the vibrancy and health of your locks, allowing you to confidently rock your desired shade. I love to educate through my social media following about hair care and hair color trends. Follow me on Instagram @denisesuzanne_ for more tips and tricks on hair care as well as different coloring trends!
