A bit of advice from my hairdyeing friends?

[beetiger]

There's a tiny little wisp of strangeness drifting through me now, and among other things, I seem to want to do something interesting to my hair. Not noticeable from a mile away, but definitely something out of the ordinary.

Therefore, two questions to you who might know:
1)If you do something like a manic panic or special effects dye on unbleached, brown hair, what do you get? Lovely purple(or whatever) highlights? Nothing at all? A muddy purple brown color that looks hideous?

2)Does anyone know of a dye out there that comes out as a raven black with noticeable blue or purple highlights? (Bleaching okay, it's not that I want to avoid bleaching, I just want a more subtle effect than bright purple).

3)If you use a black permanent dye and then use a manic panic or something on top of that once it is done, what do you get?

On a possibly related note, we saw a gang of those retired ladies with the red hats and the purple shirts at the Katonah Museum. I know, I know, it's a social club. But if they're all going to dress alike in their wacky (and very well-composed, despite the color clash) uniforms, meeting perfectly reasonable expectations of what older women do (like go to museums), don't you think they are missing the original point of the poem entirely? I want to see them having a spitting contest in the mall. *Then* I'll be impressed.

Comments

[rikibeth.livejournal.com]

I have had good results with Herbal Essences Sapphire Black for a raven-black-with-blue-highlights color on my dark brown hair.

Manic Panic OVER said dye is largely unnoticeable on me. I bleach out streaks to take the Vampire Red I love so well.

I am not terribly experienced with Manic Panic on unprocessed brown hair, so I can't offer advice there. My daughter is very, very blonde, and Midnight Blue colors true and clear on her unprocessed hair, although it fades rapidly if not applied thickly enough or not left in for several hours. Leaving the dye in until it's utterly dried is a good move. Her school pictures are in two weeks and we need to discuss if she wants to hasten the fading process and be only blonde in her picture, or if she wants fresh bright streaks. Ah, decisions.

I'd love to see pictures of the end result, whatever you do!

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Manic Panic + their reds is really intense and I like it. I wish I had a picture of it...I wouldn't call it highlights but it is an intense color.

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

I say 'go for the fresh streaks'. But then again, I'm someone whose mother actually advised her to freshen the dye in her Special Effects Atomic Pink hair before going to an interview.

[rikibeth.livejournal.com]

Heh. What sort of job was the interview for?

We've freshened the streaks (originally applied for Warped Tour this summer) for the start of school and for a concert; it's her head, so it's her decision if she wants her school picture to have blue streaks. Oddly, her grandmother (my mother) isn't disturbed by them; she thinks they're cute. My sister-in-law was the one most upset by them, and I think in her case it was because she didn't want to explain to her daughters why THEY couldn't have blue streaks!

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

It was, admittedly, an art job. There's a lot of license to have pink hair in a "professional" environment when you're an artist.