[morriganmary]

I've got dark brown or black hair. I really want to go an dirty or ash blonde. I've done some research; but still not the information I've been looking for, I didn't get much responses from my last question, therefore I'm going to be asking this again. :p

(a. Should I strip my hair, put the ash blonde color in; without it turning orange? :rolleyes:

(b. Should I strip my hair, bleach my hair, then bleach my hair again and then wait, and then put the color in? :rolleyes:

I read that if I dye my hair a ashy blonde that there will be a less chance that I will have yellow or orange tones in my hair. :rolleyes:

I would like to do this myself. I don't want to go to a hairdressers; where I live there is only one hairdresser and the money is tight. They are going to charge me $670 to get my hair bleached and stripped.

I don't have a hair college near me; if I did I would've gone by now. :)

So I'm in a no win situation, thanks for your answers. :D

[Perito]

I've got dark brown or black hair. I really want to go an dirty or ash blonde.

(a. Should I strip my hair, put the ash blonde color in; without it turning orange?

(b. Should I strip my hair, bleach my hair, then bleach my hair again and then wait, and then put the color in? :rolleyes:

I read that if I dye my hair a ashy blonde that there will be a less chance that I will have yellow or orange tones in my hair. :rolleyes:

You don't actually have many options. In fact, you probably only have one real set of options. I recommend using a "reducing-type" color remover such as ColorFix, Color Zap, or Color Oops. Most likely you will need at least two applications of the product to get the black out. Don't use bleach to try to get the black out, and don't use bleach-containing strippers like Effasol (unless, of course, you want your hair to be totally trashed).

Adding an ash blonde color is probalby not an option -- depending on what your *natural* color is. Your natural undertones determine how light the peroxide in the black hair dye, left your hair. It's likely that it will be too orange for an ash blonde color to do much.

After removing the black color, you will have to bleach your hair -- probably to "gold" or "yellow" (depending on how light you want the final collor). If you wanted to go to light blonde, you would bleach to pale yellow. The purpose of this bleaching is to lighten the remaining natural undertones (natural pigment left in the hair). After that, you'll be able to dye your hair back to the color you wish (dark blonde). You may find it easier to bleach to yellow rather than gold. While this will make your hair lighter and it might have to be touched up more often, gold can be quite problematic when you factor in the tendency to fade.

It is true that "ash" tones help minimize orange or yellow tones, but that's not the whole story. Basically, even ash will be brassy unless you bleach your hair light enough.

For more extensive advice and encouragement, I recommend this site:

Bottle Blondes Board