Blue Is The Warmest Colour: Caring for Bleached Colour Treated Hair

Hello! As promised, today's post is about hair care products.
I was to say that I'm no hair professional and everything I know is based on my experience and things that my hair dresser has told me. The things I may mention or suggest in this post are things that apply to my hair and my hair only so I don't know if they'll work on yours as well.

When I decided to work on having a healthy hair to get it ready for the disaster bleaching is, I started building a hair care routine that actually helped me a lot with keeping my hair as healthy as I possibly could and since bleaching I've stuck with this routine. I've made some changes on it ever since I dyed it blue but it's been much of the same and so, I would like to share with you my hair care routine and the products I use in order to keep it as neat as possible.

Hair Dyes

For my blue hair I chose to use La Riché Directions hair dyes. I mainly use Midnight Blue but I've also used Ebony and I just recently ordered Neon Blue because it has more of a purple hue to it.

These are vegan hair dyes with an enormous pigmentation and I shall say that they actually last for a very long time.

Shampoo

I use a very large rage of shampoos, any shampoo for damaged hair sold in supermarkets in Portugal I probably have tried. I prefer the brand Schwarzkopf because their products are actually efficient. I also Use L'Oréal and Le Petit Marseillais sometimes. The shampoo I use the most for colour treated hair is Elvive Color Vive and the one I prefer for damaged hair is Gliss Serum Deep Repair.

I mixed a bit of gentian violet into my Elvive shampoo to help kill the yellow tones in my hair and this photo above shows what it looks like.

I got this tip from my friend Catarina who has also used this products before on her own hair. This is a very inexpensive product and I got it from the pharmacy. 

Deep Conditioning 

For this part of my hair care routine I tend to use only Gliss products because they seem to be the best. Both of these two masks, Ultimate Repair and Serum Deep Repair, contain the hair's most important protein, Keratin, which is very important for its structure and for a healthy hair follicle. I use these about once or twice a week and let them set for about 5 minutes before rinsing.  

After Care

I am a huge sucker for leave in conditioners, these products save my life. They are so easy to apply and actually help the hair a lot throughout the days when you don't wash your hair. I always make sure to have Elvive Color Vive, Gliss Total Repair and Gliss Million Gloss leave in conditioners because they have proven to be the best for my hair. I apply either of these when I get out of the shower, right before brushing, to ease the pain of brushing wet hair, and also everyday before bed.

This product saved my hair after bleaching my hair last year. My hair was so so damaged and this product made it come back to life. I swear by Gliss Color Protect leave in mask. This mask is one o those masks you apply onto wet hair and leave it to do its work and this one does it perfectly. I think I've gone through five bottles of this one ever since I started dying my hair. This product locks in moisture, helps replenish the keratin in your hair and has UV protection. I can only say good things about this one and I know people who can guarantee the same.

This serum is one of the cheapest hair care products I have and yet it is so good! It is an Essentya serum for damaged hair. I use this serum everyday before bed as well because it locks in moisture. It actually leaves your hair feeling super soft!

Between dyes colour check

To bring some life to my hair colour between hair dyes I mixt this Gliss conditioner with my dye and leave it on my hair while I shower just to give it a little more brightness when it starts to wear down.

The hair dye I use is very messy so I have to mix the conditioner and dye in a separate container and I'm left with a lighter blue colour than the dye just to refresh the hair.

I am only able to do this because the hair dye I use is a pigmented conditioner which means, and is recommended by the brand, that I can mix it with any conditioner to lighten the colour, so for a wash of colour this is perfect!

Styling 

My hair is naturally wavy and curly so I use this Nivea product to define the curls I already have on my hair. I've used this for years and it has never failed me.

The Tangle Teezer is the hair brush I use. I recommend this hair brush to everyone but specially to people with bleached colour treated hair. When you bleach your hair it becomes extremely bridal and when you pull on it with regular hair brushes it tends to break or get damaged. This hair brush is perfect because it brushes and untangles your hair without ever pulling on it and with one soft swipe. It is great!

Tips:

• I try as much as I can to wash my hair only twice a week. 
  
  
• Since my hair is a bit oily at the roots I sometimes have to use dry shampoo or baby powder to help it look fresh for longer.
  
  
• When I go to the beach or pool I always spray some organic coconut oil onto the ends of my hair. This trick helps me protect my hair from the chlorine in pool water and the salt in sea water which tend to dry the hair.
  

And that's it for this post! This is how I care for my hair, I hope you enjoyed this post and I hope to be back soon with a new one.

Love, 

Anna

Summer Sale Haul

Hi! 

This is probably the first post in a long time and I would like to, once again, apologize but I really have no explanation for it. I'll try to post more regularly from now on, I promise!

Today's post is a collective haul of some makeup items I've bought over the past month or so. Since it's been some time since I actually bought these things I already have an opinion on them and so I'm going to write a review as well of each product.

Kiko Super Colour Eyeliner in 104

"coloured waterproof eyeliner, ultra shiny and intense colour"

This eyeliner is very liquid and waterproof, just like it's description says. It has a felt tip applicator which is quite harsh and pointed for flawless effects. 

The colour I chose is a black with emerald green reflects, it is not super pigmented when it comes to the black side of it, it's actually pretty sheer but has beautiful shine and metallic finish. 

I chose this colour mostly because it's such a subtle way to wear a colourful eyeliner which I love.

Here is a swatch of it. This has probably two coats of the eyeliner and is still a bit patchy but you can see how it reflects beautiful green shades. I've been using it my regular black eyeliner and it gives it a nice waterproof finish as well.

Kiko Long Lasting Stick in 37

"8 hour no-transfer eyeshadow"

This stick is probably the best purchase I've made in a long time, makeup wise. I should've bought more shades cause it is so good! I've seen Pixiwoo talk about Kiko's eyeshadow sticks and how good they are and when I had a chance I bought one and this was the most appealing colour. It has an amazing creamy texture in the beginning, it's very easy to blend and it also is very pigmented and sets to a waterproof, smudge-proof shade. When I swatched it at the store I only really got it for the colour but then when I went to take it off in the bathroom of the mall it wouldn't come off! That was when I knew I had made a great purchase.

The colour I bought is a copper shade with pink reflects. It looked perfect to create grunge rusty looks.

It blends into this copper/rusty orange colour that sets and becomes waterproof, staying on for the longest time.

I found it to be a great eyeshadow base and I tried it with Kiko's Water Eyeshadow in 2018 and Sleek's Conker Eyeshadow from the Au Naturel palette and the look lasted me all day!

Kiko Supreme Eyeshadow in 04 Gorgeous Anthracite

"long lasting creamy eyeshadow"

This cream shadow from the Supreme collection is beautiful and perfect for when you're in a rush!

Just blend some of this on and you're ready to go with the guarantee that it will last you all day.

It is a black base shadow with a thousand shimmers and shinny particles that reflect mostly silver with some hints of pink and purple in certain lights.

I didn't find it to be as long lasting and pigmented as the sticks though. 

Kiko Water Eyeshadows 

"long lasting wet & dry use eyeshadow"

In 225

These are a total dupe for Nars Dual Intensity Eyeshadows. It's the same concept, the same product but less expensive.

The pigmentation varies from colour to colour and some of these have a duo chrome which shows off beautifully when wet. They are not as long lasting as Kiko says they are.

Left is wet and right is dry.

Top is dry and bottom is wet.

This shade is a beautiful cyan blue with purple chrome that shows a lot better when wet. This particular shade has very little pigmentation when dry and loads when wet.

In 218

This was the first shade that I saw when I reached over to their water shadow set and I fell in love with it. It is such a beautiful shade of coral with golden reflects!

Left is wet and right is dry.

Top is dry and bottom is wet.

As you can see there isn't a huge difference between the dry and wet version with this one. It is just beautiful!

I've also tried this as a blush and it looks fantastic because of that golden shine.

Makeup Factory Dramatic Cream Eyeliner in 05 Drama Black

This eyeliner is just... Not worth it...

I was in need of a new gel eyeliner for a long time now and I finally decided to go into my local boutique and bought myself one and this was probably the most expensive eyeliner I ever bought and oh lord is it a disappointment... It's not pigmented, it's not waterproof, it's not opaque... It's just not worth the money.

Unlike most gel eyeliner I bought before, this one needs several layers to be opaque and since it is so creamy it won't stay in place. I do not recommend this one..

Maybelline New York The Colossal Go Extreme Volume Mascara

This was a refill/repurchase because I had run out of mascara and this is probably my favourite now.

The brush is perfect to coat all lashes and separate them.

Essence LipLiner in 05 Soft Berry

I bought this lip liner hoping for it to be somewhere near the Kylie Jenner colour and it kind of is. It's a deep nude colour perfect to outline the lips with or, if you don't mind, to fill in the whole lip.

I usually fill in the whole lip with it and use it on its own and I've actually gotten a lot of compliments on it!

Astra Itally Eyebrow Pencil in 23

This eyebrow pencil has the perfect shade of taupe for my hair colour. To match my brows to my hair has been just way too hard so I decided to hunt down a brow pencil that would look good with my blue hair and this grey'ish taupe was the perfect shade.

When I first swatched it in the store it looked too light for me but it turned out to be perfect!

The only down side to it is that it is such a hard pencil, the tip of it is actually super hard and solid. It's not creamy at all. The fact that eyebrow pencils are hard usually means that they stay on for longer and I cannot dismiss that fact, it does stay on all day!

Only good things to say about this one!

Astra Italy Jumbo Eyeshadow Pencil in 61

This beautiful colour caught my eye the first time I went in the store and the second time I knew I had to get it.

It is a gorgeous water green with a metallic finish.

It is very creamy and blends beautifully but doesn't stay on as long as any other eyeshadow pencils/sticks I have.

Astra Italy Define Lip Lip Pencil in 42

This lip pencil I haven't gotten too much use out of yet. Since I lost my favourite red lipstick I haven't been wearing too much red on my lips but I thought it would be a good idea to finally get a new red lip liner.

It does its job, not much to say about it.

Catrice Limited Edition Nomadic Traces Matt Lip Colour in CO2 Urban Red

This lipstick is just perfect. The concept of this lipstick, the formula and the colour make it the perfect lipstick for anyone which a busy schedule. It applies very easily and creamy with an already matte finish and stays on a long long time even when you eat!

The only down side to it is when you reapply it over a bit of it that was left it starts flaking and feels a bit weird on the lips.

When I was taking these photos I actually realized how close these two lip pencils are. Top is Astra's and bottom is Catrice's.

After taking these photos I also received Lancôme Gradiose Mascara which I didn't take pictures of but my overall opinion on it is that it's not worth the money. It's an expensive mascara that leaves your lashes clumpy and takes a log time to dry. The curve brush is not that big of an innovation because the brush itself collects too much products, leaving the lashes too loaded with mascara.

And that's it for this post! I hope you enjoyed it and until my next one!

Love,

Anna

Paranormal Hairtivity

Hi! Today I have the so promised hair post. I've been trying to prepare this post for quite some time now and it's not going to turn out as good as I wanted to anyway. I've been having some problems posting and that's why the previous post was only posted today with another date. I couldn't upload the photos of the previous post so I had to change some things in the HTML code and I'm a noob with it so it took a little longer.

Disclaimer: This post is going to be huge, I have a lot of things to explain and at least 23 photos for you to be able to fully accompany my hair evolution, so bear with me! I'm also going to divide this post by colours to be easier to explain chronologically.

Natural

My natural hair colour is this warm shade of brown that you can see in this photo above. This photo is about 4 years old so excuse my baby face.
I had my hair this colour for most of my childhood until a couple of years ago. The only thing I did to my hair during this period of time while it had it's natural colour was highlights and a subtle ombré. I remember having copper highlights that quickly faded back to my natural colour and the ombré lasted me quite some time until I had my hair cut past the ombré. The ombré I had was very discrete in a copper shade as well that matched my natural reflexes perfectly so it looked very natural. All of these procedures were achieved in a hair salon with the help of my hairdresser.

Reds

This was the first time I ever did dye my hair completely a shade different from mine.
I had always had a fascination for redheads and red hair and I even remember wanting to dye my hair orange (nowadays orange is my least favourite hair colour on myself) so on my birthday I went to my hairdresser and asked for a dark burgundy shade of red that had some pink and purple reflexes. I was very pleased with this result but I wanted it stronger so I bought a box dye from the supermarket (huge mistake) in a similar shade that gave me an intense and bright red with purple and pink reflexes in the sun as you can see in the picture above.

It soon faded to this weird warm brown kind of shade, remaining considerably darker on the ends.

At some point I remember dying the ends black to achieve some sort of ombré from the reds to the black.
I remember having this for quite some time and my hair was huge.
By the time, I was dying my hair with professional hair dye mixed with 20 volume developer at home (list of dyes will be in the end).

Blues and blacks

Then I decided that blue was a better option and I had my friend Catarina bleach my hair and dye it blue but surprise! it turned out horrible because we didn't bleach it enough. I had a green mess with blue and brown patched on my hair and I completely despised it so I bought some blue, blue black and black dyes and gave myself an ombré. The roots were very blue, then most of the hair was blue black and the ends were just black, as you can see in the photo above. This photo was taken about a year ago in the month of July, approximately in the 6th of July.

The blue soon started to fade and, displeased with the result, I dyed it all black. It was a huge mistake but yeah. Here's a photo.

In this photo I am back to the blues and blacks. What happened was I dyed the top part of my hair with a purple hair dye mixed in with 40 volume developer, which lightened my hair enough to dye it blue again. The purple didn't stick around too long so here's a photo of the blue.

Pinks, Reds, Purples

When the blue faded it turned a horrible colour of green so I bought this pigmented conditioner that said it would maintain purple hair longer but it turned out to be bright pink and so I applied that to the top half of my hair, achieving again an ombré effect. The photo above was taken in November of last year.

That colour faded quite fast if you didn't apply the conditioner at every single wash so then I gave up and in the photo above you can see my hair was considerably black at the ends and a weird shade of brown on the top.

This photo is from last year's Christmas. I had this weird brown colour with black ends.

Transition from warm tones to cool tones

At this point I had made up my mind about the blue hair. I wanted it but I wanted it to be perfect and without patches, just blue throughout. 

I knew that to achieve my goal I had to get rid of the red shades I had in my hair as much as I possibly could without bleaching it just yet, so I went to the hairdresser to cut my hair shoulder length to get rid of the black damaged part and had her give my hair a "gloss" of a colour that was similar to my natural shade of hair. I did this because I didn't want to walk around with stripes across my hair marking where my regrowth ended and the dyed part started.

My hair was like this since February till June.

Bleaching process and final goal

I had set, in my mind, that I had to get my hair blue by July of this year and so I thought: I'm probably going to have to bleach my hair at least three times, because it was so dark and had so much history in it colour wise. Since I had exams I thought I could bleach my hair after prom, let it rest for a week, go in to bleach again, rest another week and bleach one final time and by the end of my finals I'd be done with my hair. 

But I went to a different hairdresser for this bleaching procedure and it did not happen like that.

I had my hair bleached three times, as I thought I would need, but they bleached it three times in one single sitting. I went in at 9 a.m. and I left the salon at 2 p.m. with very light bleached hair.

They bleached my hair the first time and the bleach was on my hair for about 30 minutes. The photo above shows the result of the first bleach.

Here you can see how much regrowth I had, the yellowish part is the regrowth and the rest was the pieces I had dyed with a million colours before.

Then they bleached my hair a second time and this time they applied the bleach to the roots as well.

At this point the two hairdressers working on my hair realized that they weren't going to be able to bleach my hair to white as I thought I needed because I had so much colours applied to it before.

The photo above shows how it looked during the third and final bleach.

After removing all the bleach, the hairdresser applied a blue tinted protein mask to my hair. She said the light blue in it was going to help tone the yellow down.

Snapchat: argoma

This photo shows the end result. This is what my hair looked like when I left the hairdresser.

I felt a bit like Kim K when she bleached her hair.

It was almost white at the very roots, a very very light yellow shade through the regrowth and a light orange in the rest with some white pieces.

Goals achieved

When I arrived home, that same day, after lunch, I dyed it blue.

I had the remnants of a blue hair dye I had used before and I thought that if I diluted it enough it would be enough for my whole head of hair but it wasn't. I freaked out and called the only person I knew could help me. I called Catarina and she had some blue/green colour, from when she dyed hers that colour, that she borrowed me to finish the rest.

Snapchat: argoma

This was what it looked like after that first wash of colour. It was a bit greener that I would like.

Until my dyes arrived I probably washed my hair about four times and it faded to a very light pastel blue and turquoise. It always looked darker on camera so yeah..

My hair was so damaged that I went to my hairdresser and asked her to cut off most of the damaged parts and it turns out the person that bleached my hair (in another salon) broke my hair a lot more on the left side than on the right side and for that reason I had a lot more volume of hair on the right side than on the left side.

I believe this happened because, since my hair was so bridal, when she was brushing it right after bleaching, she pulled too much on the hair and it broke. 

And that's how you learn not to visit a hairdresser again!

When the dyes arrived I asked Catarina to dye my hair again and this time the shade that I really wanted. The two photos above show how my hair looks like right now.

I am so so happy with the end result!! I've wanted my hair to be blue for a long time and I waited one painful year to get it to this beautiful shade so I am just so so happy!

I've gotten a lot of compliments on it since I got it but also some stares, which was expected. My dad doesn't particularly like it too much... But oh well!

This has been my hair evolution so far!

In the beginning of August I'm thinking of changing it a little bit again, we'll see!

List of dyes used since the beginning (chronologically, at home treatments):

• Garnier Nutrisse Ultra Color 5.62 Bold Red
• Karisa 77.62 Intense Iriside Auburn
• Violett60 F/51 Blue
• Shot 1.10 Blue Black
• Shot 1 Black
• Shot Viola Toner
• La Riché Directions Midnight Blue
• Karisa 77.62 Intense Iriside Auburn
• Shot 6.2 Brilliant Dark Blond
• Garnier Olia 4.6 Red Brown
• La Riché Directions Midnight Blue
• La Riché Directions Ebony
• La Riché Direction Midnight Blue 

I'll have a post about my hair care next week or so where I will talk you through the products I use and how I got my hair to be healthier than it was when I bleached it.

A post about the look of the last two photos will be up on friday.

I hope you liked this huge post!

Obs I: Title of the post inspired by Guy Tang.

Obs II: Most of these photos were taken with my phone and are unedited or taken from my personal Instagram.

Love,

Anna