Mi Ombré!

Ombré hair has been around for quite a while, I know, but I am not one to follow trends so kiber! If you follow me on Twitter you'll know that I have been bored with black hair for more than a year and was looking into things I could do. Ombré hair was on top of the list, I also considered whipping out the good ol' bangs, shaving one side of my head, and dying it whole lilac or any purple shade, srsly!

It took me this long to finally do ombré hair because bleaching powder and toners are such a b**ch to get a hold in this country-- it's either you wait for HBC to restock their bleaching powder (which are always sold out) or wait another 2 months for pre-ordered items. Since waiting is involved in both options, I went for the former because it's cheaper. Anyhoo, this post is to show you guys how I did mi ombré hair.

Things needed:

• Hair bleaching powder and developer (or you can buy a bleaching kit or a highlighting kit for less hassle)
• Non-metallic bowl and a hair color applicator brush
• Long hair clips for making hair partitions
• Aluminum foil and scissors
• Barber's cape (or whatever you call it. Not in picture.)
• Hair color kit of your choice
• Gloves (I used the ones that are included in the Revlon kit)

Notes: Aside from this particular bleaching method I used, you can also use a highlighting kit for no mixing hassle but I highly doubt it's also available in stores. // Non-metallic bowls should be used to avoid chemicals from the bleach to mix with the metallic bowl's chova. I know you know what I mean! // They said that you should get hair color kits with "ash" on them to serve as your toner -- which takes out the brassiness and orange of your hair. Since "ash blondes" isn't readily available too (sucks!) I went with whatever blond shade is on sale just to take out the orange parts.

 First split your hair into small sections using long hair clips to make sure your application will be even throughout. I know my partition skills are bad, hah! But you get the idea.

Then mix the bleach powder with the developer. I mixed 1 part bleaching powder to 3 parts developer. Mixture shouldn't be sticky because it'll be hard to work with it.

Next step, which I didn't get to take a photo of, is put on an old shirt and your "barber's cape" to avoid bleach going to places you don't want. Then apply the mixture on the bottom ends of your hair first where you want the color to be the lightest.

Once you're done applying the bleach, cover it with Aluminum foil and leave it on for 30 mins. After 30 mins. wash the bleach out and repeat bleach application  - this time apply the bleach higher on your hair. Maybe from under your lips up to the ends of your hair. Wrap it with Aluminum foil again and wait another 30 mins.

Above is the result after 2 sessions of bleach application -- orange-y ickyness. I had to have 2 sessions of hair bleaching (1 day apart) in order to really lighten my hair and reach the shade I wanted.

I let my hair rest for 3 days then I applied the Revlon Colorsilk kit to take out the horrific orange in my hair. Halloween lang ang peg!

Above is the outcome of my experiments. Chos! But seriously it was trial and error; I didn’t know what I’d look like after every application. Left photo is raw and the right one’s edited.

Considering I’m no hairdresser and this being the first time I bleached my hair, I’d say I did a good job. My mane still isn’t the blond color I’d like it to be but I achieved the “fading effect” the ombré hairstyle is all about. And being the restless person that I am, I am now thinking about dying my ombre pink or purple or red. I don’t know! We’ll see. Haha!

I hope this “sort-of-ombré-tutorial” made sense. I’m really bad at explaining things but, hey, I tried! Also, I apologize for the quality of the photos. The DSLR is with the sister so I had to make do with the iPhone’s cam.

Enjoy!