Grey Blending FAQ’s

There are a lot of different definitions of grey blending out there. The way I explain grey blending to my clients is that the grey blending technique uses a combination of highlights, lowlights and toning to soften the line of demarcation between your natural roots (grey) and your previously colored ends. In essence, you are not covering your greys any longer—you are “marrying” them into your existing hair color.

Grey Blending is not grey transformation. I have clients who have decided they don’t want to continue covering their roots with permanent hair color every 3 weeks. They want to strip (full bleach) all of the color out and change the color to grey. For example during a consultation I had a client come in who had decided she didn’t want red hair any longer, she wants grey hair today. She didn’t want to do this gradually, she wanted an extreme change. As I explained to her, this is not considered a grey transformation it is a color correction and that is the service we booked.

Her hair would need to be stripped of all artificial color, bleached and toned to grey, this appointment is a long one, plan for at least 6-8 hours at the salon. Again, if you want to go this route, please visit a specialist or discuss this with your stylist. The full bleach and tone in it’s self is a specialty and takes special skills, techniques and formulation. Plan on a long visit initially and maintenance over time.

I always talk with my guests about their previous hair coloring history, because the previous color that remains, needs to be addressed properly. The answer to this question will determine the health of your hair now and what it will take to get it in the condition it needs to be to begin the grey blending process.

We did strand tests all the time and most guests said how much they appreciated seeing a small section of their hair tested and the color agreed upon before moving forward and coloring the entire head.
This important step guarantees the color will lift as expected and protects against unexpected results saving hours of your time and your stylists time.

I always explain to my guest that the initial appointment is the most expensive because of these two primary factors. One being the time it takes to do it well. There are two appointments to get started. The first we schedule a consultation and a strand test. Then the acutal appointment time. We start all of our grey blends with a pre color treatment, Malibu Color Disruptor. Then we move on to the actual grey blending technique “baby lights” and low lights followed by processing time. Then a toner is applied and processed again, post treatment and style time. It takes several hours(4-6 hours) and a lot of product, not to mention the time it took your stylist to become educated and updated in this technique.