Salon-Inspired Hair Color At Home

My sister and I decided to take the plunge with box dye, and after reading a ton of your recommendations on my last post about the perils of at-home box dye, I took all of your comments to heart and asked my sister if I could dye her roots next time. I asked because she has slightly darker hair than mine, which means her roots are more visible (sorry sis!) and therefore we would be better able to tell if we could combat the number one issue with box dyes: that is, that roots are categorically treated the same as ends, when they shouldn't. 

My sister's hair is naturally thick, medium-to-fine in consistency, and she has a lot of it! She says that her hair tends to frizz in high humidity. She's been dyeing her hair at home for years, always with the squeezie tubes, and finds that her hair color results in a lackluster finish.

Before

Above: my sister, Michelle's hair before the "procedure". Notice the overall warmth of the blonde, which is starting to border on brassy, and her naturally dark blonde/light brown roots showing through. On the bottom right you'll notice the crown, a spot she often misses.

I chose the Vidal Sassoon Salonist hair dye kit because it promised to treat the roots differently than the ends, abolishing the age-old problem of roots that don't match your ends, no matter if you are going darker or lighter.

This formulation was unique, one that I hadn't seen before. It starts off as the thick paste/cream consistency we're all used to, but it comes with a brush you would normally find in the salon and a bowl (instead of the cheap squeeze tube). The best part is, you can do it all yourself.

The roots are covered in a systematic fashion that was super easy to follow on the instruction sheet. We let that sit for 30 minutes, then a tube filled with a serum was added to a portion of the mixture that was set aside for this last step. Then it became a much thinner consistency, which I then massaged throughout the ends of my sister's hair, almost like shampoo. This sat for a few more minutes, and we then rinsed out her hair, shampooed, and conditioned with the included deep conditioner (probably the best part of any box dye, no?).

Her hair was silky smooth afterward, but best of all--her ends and her roots finally matched for the first time ever since she's been dyeing her hair at home! She couldn't top looking at her hair in the mirror, and touching it, and we both kept remarking how shiny her hair was. It had a lot of dimension, depth, and tones that one would expect from a salon visit.

After

Roots? What roots! It is a perfect match. I'm seriously incredulous.

You've gotta try this stuff.

This post was brought to you in part by Vidal Sassoon and myself, who teamed up to share my honest experience with an at-home box hair dye. No animals, opinions, or hairstylists were harmed in the making of this blog post.