How do salons bleach hair

Applying a toner tames those unruly tones and makes them disappear. All of this means it takes significantly longer to bleach your hair at a salon.

Now, maybe you can't afford to bleach your hair in a salon. Or maybe you're confident you can bleach your hair at home. If so, keep reading, because now we'll discuss how long it takes to bleach your hair at home, as well as some important tips. Mainly because, it's hard to apply the bleach evenly throughout your hair by yourself, especially to the back of your head.

No matter how many mirrors you have, you can't see the back of your head as clearly as another person. If you don't cover all your hair evenly, the product won't bleach your hair evenly While you wait, you should keep a close eye on your hair, just like what a hairstylist does at a salon.

This is because everyone's hair is unique, so yours might process faster or slower than the average. And that's not an exaggeration or a scare tactic, it's the truth. If you leave the bleach in longer then 45 minutes, the chemical process can destroy the hair's fiber and cause it to break off like a frayed rope. Would you like to know another difference between bleaching your hair at home or a salon that can change how long it might take? There are no breezes in a salon, and the temperature is always comfortable, both in summer and winter.

And it's not just for the client's comfort, but so that the dyes stay at a consistent temperature. At home, on the other hand, people tend to bleach their hair in a cool bathroom or kitchen. This cools down your hair and slows the bleaching process, so it may take 45 minutes instead of half an hour. In the case of a cool environment, a professional will use a heat cap or aluminum foil to control the temperature and therefore how your hair processes.

If you're attempting a less drastic change, such as from brown to blond, you can do it yourself, just make sure to keep a close eye on how your hair is reacting during the process. And while it may be fine to remove your gel manicure at home or trim your split ends when you're in a pinch, if there's one thing we advise you to not DIY, it's bleaching your own hair. In terms of bleaching your hair, before we begin, let's get one thing straight: "Bleaching" the hair doesn't actually require literal bleach.

According to cosmetic chemist Ginger King , bleach as a household cleaner is way different than hydrogen peroxide that is found in hair lighteners. In the salon, the bleaching process entails a very tedious process. According to colorist Rachel Bodt , the method requires sectioning the hair into very small pieces with a precise brush and mixing bonding treatments like Olaplex into the hydrogen peroxide to prevent breakage.

These types of treatments aren't sold to customers, just licensed professionals. Once the formula is all mixed, it's applied to those small sections and then the hair is covered in foil or plastic, which will then marinate for 30 to 60 minutes.

That said, bleaching at home is considered ill-advised by professionals. According to Bodt, you should never use any type bleach your own hair at home — even if it's just a root touch-up. The technique for this service is very meticulous, meaning it requires a lot of attention and detail. I'm a pretty chatty person — I consider it part of my Southern "charm" I call it "charm," you might call it "annoying personality trait," whatever.

And so I make the usual small talk with my stylist How's the kid? How's the dog? But after about 15 minutes, I hit the conversational wall with my poor stylist. The process of bleaching your hair can take hours — who has that much to chat about? I know that chemicals in hair bleach are bad. Really bad. If you've never had your hair bleached, here's what happens: a bunch of burny-y feeling chemicals sit on your head for an extended amount of time, until you're pretty sure that your scalp will melt.

And they you're blonde! Why do we do this to ourselves? If I hadn't spent the past decade marinating my brain in all that bleach, maybe I could properly explain it to you. The salon head massage has been confusing me for at least a decade. It's already a strange sensation to have someone else wash my hair, so when they go from conditioning my hair into a full-on head massage, my whole body tenses up. I'm pretty sure that's not the idea behind the scalp massage — it's supposed to soothe you during your long, arduous journey into blondeness.

I juts can't get around that. Like, I know we've logged a lot of hours in close physical proximity while dyeing my hair, but this step is always just too much for me.