What you need... here some ideas great as visual cues! Think is relations such as types of wood grains tobacco colors visual color definitions. Have a mental idea of what you want and not the... "I don't know want I want but this is not it" The hair is just one tone from scalp to ends. It's also referred to as a base color. For covering gray hair, a single-process is all you need. Single-process hair color is what you want to ask for at the salon if you want an all-over hue update.

A DOUBLE PROCESS... is a base color plus highlights. Make sure to book additional time at the salon if you want a two-step hair change, and requires maintenance however; which looks more natural in the end. Double-process has gotten a bad reputation over the years, but it doesn't have to be unhealthy for the hair when done by a professional.

BABY-LIGHTS... are placed around your hairline and on your part. It doesn't go too deep within your hair," Robert Serge explains. "Just think subtle, delicate - and it's good for fine hair. The technique is taking really small pieces. Take a traditional highlight and cut it in half."

PONYTAIL HIGHLIGHTS... If a client wears a lot of up-dos, Robert Serge adds in a few ponytail highlights near the nape and over the ears. "I think it's good to keep some highlights around the whole perimeter of your head because it seems lighter without doing full, internal highlights," she explained. "When you lift [the hair] you have just the few highlights over the darkness, and it looks natural."

BRAUNDE... Is she blonde or brunette? No one really knows. That's why colorist created a term just for that middle space - braunde. Robert Serge described it as taking a woman with dark blonde or light brown hair and adding a layer of highlights.

BALAYAGE... When you see the colorist at the chair next to you meticulously painting every strand of hair with bleach, that is balayage. In French, the word means sweeping or scanning. It's just a myth that balayage always looks more natural than a foil highlight. "If [the colorist] is being heavy handed, someone can end up with these chunks right on their hairline," Robert Serge explained. "the difference between a good balayage and a good foil in my opinion is a less line of demarcation with balayage it's a softer look."

LOW-LIGHTs... are the exact opposites of highlights. Think types of exotic wood grains such as teak,cherry, walnut just pick one or three... They are darker pieces of hair usually reserved for the layers underneath and around the neck. "If kids are out in the sun, the top of their heads get really light and the middle, back, and under are always darker because that part doesn't see the sun."Low-lights might also be in order if your highlights have morphed into one solid color over time. "I call it the buildup of highlights," Robert Serge explained. "If you go every 6-10 weeks, and get highlights over and over, eventually you will probably need some low-lights to break it up because things just get solid."

ROOTS 2 TONE... If your schedule won't allow hair color appointments every six weeks, ask your stylist to ROOTS 2 TONE your hair. "We do all the highlights, and then we put a gloss or a toner or a color on the roots to tone it down," Robert Serge explained. "It's just something that takes away the contrast so it doesn't look so bold or blatant in the regrowth. I like to compare it to smudging your eyeliner or rooting."

DIP DYE ENDS... OR MOPPING THE ENDS is the most extreme form of ombré. There is a clear demarcation where one color ends and the other begins. This high-contrast technique is definitely for the more bold client, and it looks fabulous with rainbow shades especially. Nice in pink too!COLOR BLAST just one side FX color enhancement.

OMBRé... is the hair color trend that won't go away or ever die. Every Summer women want sun-kissed color that is dark at the roots and lighter on the tips because it's so low maintenance. "When it first came out the idea was to lighten up just the ends, and it looked natural because on a child hair goes from dark to light on a strand," Robert Serge said. "It's like a beach braun, pretty and subtle."

SOMBR'E... who names this stuff?Robert Serge described sombré (solar + ombré) as the marriage of typical ombré with baby-lights. There are some highlights near the roots, but the majority of the color is still at the ends

TABAC... is more highlighted than sombré, and it's less ombré than ombré," Robert Serge explained. "It basically adds more highlights to the top portion of the hair and it makes the ombré even more subtle." The key to getting the tortoiseshell look on brunette hair is to ask for golden tones. Key words to use with your colorist are honey, caramel, and copper any color found in tobacco.

DUSTLIGHTS... Literally, it's highlights with A DUSTING OF LIGHTER. It's a new emerging trend that's just barely started in salons, but pretty soon it will be the buzzed-about technique. "Its a form of hair painting," Robert Serge said. "You apply color with a surface placement and it just touches the surface of that hair, so you're not penetrating it." The effect is sun kissed, barely-there color.

OXIDATION... When your color just doesn't look as vibrant and it's time for a touch up, it's probably the fault of oxidation. And blondes aren't the only ones who get brassy. Oxidation can happen to brunettes and redheads, too. "People think it's the sun that oxidizes, but it's just the elements: hard water in your faucet, shampoo, conditioner," Robert Serge explained. "Permanent color in general has an expiration date."At around four weeks when your hair color starts to turn, book a toner or gloss or buildup remover with your salon (and a conditioning treatment, too). At home make sure to use a Blonde Brass Banish Shampoo (blue purple base). It's not just for blondes! According to Robert Serge, brunettes with ombré hair color and highlights can go brassy too. Then there is pink, green, opal, steel and whatever color you can find at Walmart.

HINTS... If You Tan Easily and Have Brown Eyes…“You can get away with a more golden shade, think J-Lo whether you're blonde or brunette. However, if you're thinking about being a redhead, it's the opposite. You want to stay away from anything that's coppery or golden, and you want to go towards more of a garnet, or crimson sort of stop-sign-red,” Robert Serge advises.

If you have Fair skin with Light Eyes…“Stay away from gold and do things that are more neutral to ash too much gold will exaggerate the pink tones in your skin. If you're going red you can get away with doing a lot of copper. If you think of Nicole Kidman when she was sporting the red, she's so fair, and light eyed, that she could pull off that really coppery red,” Robert Serge explains.

TOP OF Page

If You Have Darker tone Skin Stay away from brassy, if you're going lighter. If you think of Beyoncé, she always has a lot of blonde in her hair, but it's always a very wheat, neutral, or ash blonde, there's never a lot of gold in it, so that's why it works. For darker skin if you're going red, it's all about garnet and red-red, like when Rihanna did that red-red, where there's really no orange in it at all, and it looked great on her skin,” Robert Serge explains."