[Korms]

I'm in the process of going from red (which is equally as hard to get rid of) to a dark blonde.

I'll post what I have done so far, maybe it can be of some help to you.

First of all, I let the dye fade as much as it could just by washing. I bought a clarifying shampoo and used that at every wash. This may seem like common sense, but aviod colour care type shampoos and conditioners.

Fading the dye with shampoo took about a month. I then began the colour removal process. I tried two different colour removers that are available in the UK. The first was Goldwell System Colour Remover, which worked adequately enough but there wasn't much product in the kit. I used this three times over the course of two months. The next colour removing product I tried is by a company called Affinage and their product is called Eraser. It is a little more expensive but you get twice as much product and I found it worked better than the Goldwell version. A tip about colour removers; you need to SCRUB your hair when rinsing as they work by reducing the size of the colour molecules so they can be washed from the hair. I would shampoo my hair about 10 times immediately after using a colour remover just to be sure the molecules were out. How effectively the remover works will depend on how much colour your previous dye job deposited. I had quite a lot of colour in my hair and found that five removals lightened the majority of my hair to a golden brown colour, with some red still remaining in the front portions of hair. If you do use a colour remover, follow the instructions exactly. These colour removers are very gentle on hair and mine was not damaged at all during the stripping.

Before dying my hair I used a product by Goldwell called Pre-colour as I have found it very diffucult to obtain fillers such as Colorful's Protein Filler (an American product) here in the UK. The dye I chose to put over my stripped hair was an ash blonde tone with a blue-violet base which helped to counter-act any red or golden tones. I also used a drabber for additional help in counteracting red and gold. Using the ash blonde colour took my hair to a neutral medium brown. When you re-dye your hair I would suggest using a lighter colour than what you actually want as your hair will be porous and using a brown dye may make it black again. Try to avoid hair dyes that you can buy in Boots and Superdrug, they are no good for your hair in the long run. If you can get to a beauty supply store (we do have Sally's in the UK) then get a professional colour.

After a few days I added some highlights using the Jerome Russell B Blonde kit. This helped to give the illusion of blonde hair but without too much damage as I was only bleaching small strands. It also ensured any brassiness was less noticable as it blended with the ash tones already in my hair. Home highlighting kits are a bit crap in all honesty but I can't afford to get to a hairdressers right now, foil highlights would have been better for a more natural look.

Anyway, this was kind of a long winded post and I don't know if it will be of any help to you. I have no professional knowledge of hairdressing so what I am suggesting may not be right for you, but it worked for me.

Also, be patient! Going from black to brown will not happen overnight. Do it gradually to avoid as much damage as possible.