Hi Lynnda, sorry for the delay in response. If your hair is naturally a white/silver grey then you shouldn’t need to use Decolour Stripper. You should be able to use Decolour Remover on it. When you apply a peroxide-based colourant to natural white/silver hair the peroxide tends to lighten the pure white (of the grey) to a light yellow. What happens here is the natural keratin colour (which is yellow) is exposed. Therefore, when anyone with natural white hair tries to remove an artificial colour, they find the hair looks more of a light brassy blonde than grey/white once removed. The pink contains a small amount of red molecule, which is enough to neutralise a small amount of green (aka mint). What you should find, is the hair turns to a silver or pearl blonde. If you find the hair looks a tad pink, it’s fine just clarify it once and this should balance it out. If you feel the hair still has a green tinge (after the pink), just repeat the pink application again. However, at some point (in months to come) you are going to start see a lot more darker hair appearing nearer the top sections. What it might be worth you trying is to use a tone on tone method. I am mindful of your medical condition and know how this effects hair quality. Therefore, if you started to apply a 9.17 based colourant with 10 volume peroxide your natural white hair will colourise to a silver ash. However, your non grey (darker hair) won’t be lightened, but will take on a cool tone. A permanent colourant with a 10 volume developer is pretty gentle and whilst it cannot lighten it will cover natural white. The 9 base is a light blonde, the 17 pigment is the ash violet. With this approach you are colourizing your white hair to a ivory silver and when this intermixes with the dark hair it will create a more silver medium grey effect. Some people found that they could leave their hair that way after de-colouring it. The remover works evenly without leaving any blotches and uneven coloured spots. But if you are not comfortable with the final colour, you can use a dye immediately after. What we like about it:

Mix equal parts baking soda and lemon juice. Leave the mixture on your hair for just a few minutes. Lemon can really dry and damage your hair, so remember not to leave it on for too long. For nearly 2 decades I have used Sun-In to lighten my naturally brown hair to blonde (I have been told in the past I have natural golden tones in my hair – Is this warmth? – Also, I know people hate Sun-In, but it always worked beautifully on my hair – it gave me the results I wanted). Hi Lisa, Decolour Stripper (Blue Box) would not be right for you, because that product is designed for people who want to strip both their natural and artificial colour. The Decolour shade you need is Decolour Remover (Red box). Decolour Remover will not lighten your natural underlying hair colour. However, you need to understand that permanent colour will likely have lightened your natural colour somewhat, simply because permanent colourants contain peroxide. So even when the shade is dark, the peroxide still lightens the natural (underlying) colour as it deposits the new permanent shade. Some describe it as cat pee and other say it smells like rotten eggs. This could be because the colour remover is extra-powerful to ensure it works on darker hair dyes. After de-colouring your hair you can re-dye it immediately without any problem. What we like about it:

How do hair colour removers work?

Permanent hair dye replaces some of your natural hair colour molecules with artificial colour molecules. So what a hair colour remover does is get inside your hair shafts and dissolves the bonds holding the colour molecules together. It also shrinks the molecules. NB These methods may be extremely drying and cause damage depending on the current health of your hair. If you have thin, fragile hair or a sensitive scalp, use these with caution and speak to a professional. Doing a strand test is a very sensible idea. Follow up with deep conditioning treatments or hair masks to counteract these chemical treatments. Alternative methods for stripping hair color at home If you are thinking about removing your permanent hair colour, we found five really effective and safe hair colour removers online. Here they are.

It’s important to thoroughly wash out all the dye. If even a little is left behind, it could start re-colouring your hair again. That’s why many hair colour removers recommend rinsing for 20 minutes or more. When trying to expose natural white/grey you need to be mindful that you may not be completely white or silver throughout. Hi Diane, firstly yes natural golden tones are warmth, but here is the thing. People tend to hate Sun-In because it can only lift by about two shades and generally exposes the warmth in the hair. It seems that you actually quite like the effect this has on your hair, so it leads to my next suggestion.

When you apply a permanent colourant, the peroxide in the colourant will lighten the hair a level or two, pretty much exactly as Sun-in works. However, you cannot see this underlying lightening because the artificial colour molecules sit on the top. When you use a hair colour remover it takes out the artificial molecules and exposes the lightened hair underneath. This is where many people discover the previous colourant lightened their hair to a coppery colour. However, if you have long found your hair lifts to a nice colour with Sun-In, it’s very possible that if you used Decolour Remover, you would discover the hair was a shade you liked underneath, as that peroxide in the colourants developer would have been lifting up your natural brown hair, just as Sun-In does.

Hi There, well it might be worth giving your hair another application of Decolour Remover if you think there was a lot of build up. I would suggest the next application at maybe the 7 day point from the first application of Decolour. Do you think this would work? Is there any other product you would recommend either before during or after this process?

Frequently asked questions

Generally, if your hair feels strong it would take several treatments. If you apply Decolour Stripper (blue box) to wet hair and work it through, it should go lighter and redder. To get a good base to create a red shade, you want to get the hair stripped to an orange-red level. Then apply a permanent red shade to the hair immediately afterwards. Whilst you cannot recolour with a peroxide based shade immediately after Decolour Remover (red box), Decolour Stripper is designed for the purpose of immediately re-colouring.

This method works best if you do it within a few days of dying your hair. You will still see results after this timeframe, but the results may be minimal.Bleach and Shampoo:If you feel particularly daring, try mixing a little bleach in with your shampoo. This method lightens the artificial dye, but may also affect your natural color, so proceed at your own risk. You should test this mixture on a strand of hair first before doing your entire head. The bleach may be too strong and may cause permanent damage. Be careful if you decide to try this. I may still do it and have tried a Silver Grey Semi-Pernament in an attempt to colour or at least tone in the blonde to make the transition easier but it had little effect. I did use your clarifying shampoo beforehand. Hair Colour Removers like Decolour Remover (red box) cannot technically work on semi-permanent fashion colours. However, whilst Decolour Stripper will get the unwanted purple shade out of the hair, it will also lighten the underlying base, so you would lose your balayage which is sitting under your purple colour. I know Decolour Remover can generally get semi-permanent reds out of the hair (due to the red colour molecule). However, what tends to happen is the red will flush out of the purple shade and leave a blue behind. If the blue (left behind) is a fairly standard blue, applying a pastel pink throughout this hair will create a lavender result. However, if the blue appears more like a mint green, the pastel pink turns this mint green colour to a beige blonde. Timing is also key; do not attempt to conduct several permanent colour processes on your hair within a one-month period. Frequent exposure to peroxides, ammonia and PPDs can cause the hair to become very porous and damaged. Once hair becomes damaged, it is then difficult to achieve a good colourant result, as the shade could grab initially and appear too dark or patchy, and then fade fast over subsequent washes. 11. Fashion Colours Can Be Difficult to Remove I went to the hairdresser and as it was winter she suggested a gloss, which I didn’t understand to be a semi permanent brownish colour, nonetheless it turned out a lot darker than I would’ve thought as oppose to a gloss which I perceived as maybe a very subtle darker shade with an abundance of shine. It has shine but is too dark.