Henna over bleached/blonde hair?

**CrystalStar** · April 7th, 2009, 02:13 AM

Hiya everyone, lately I've been sick of my bleach damaged hair which I'm desperately trying to grow out, and I used Lush henna over it, and turns out I supposedly suit being a redhead

However, this colour is temporary and being honest isn't the colour I want, on me I don't want orange, I kinda wanna go for a proper red look

However, I'm kinda scared if I put my BAQ henna on my bleached hair I'm gonna go crazy orange and there'll be nothing I can do to repair it..

Is there anyone with experience hennaing over bleached or blonde and have managed to make it red, not orange?

Thank you so much for your time

**rach** · April 7th, 2009, 05:30 AM

before

"two" full applications worth to get this red (first app was sightly to orange, second turned it red for me)

after

hair feels much nicer too

**Fencai** · April 7th, 2009, 05:58 AM

check out my pics. I did henna over platinum bleach blonde.
It made such a difference!!!! Helped to heal the damage.
(although my BFF and photographer both keep trying to get me back to blonde!)

also, when you first do a BAQ henna, it will look bright orange until it oxidizes.. so just give it about a week to settle down

**CrystalStar** · April 8th, 2009, 03:23 AM

Thank you both very much

However it makes me wonder, when my natural hair colour grows through am I gonna have a two-toned effect on my natural hair as opposed to my bleached hair?

**Jeni** · April 8th, 2009, 05:57 AM

Yes you are, but how much depends on how much darker your natural color is compared to your dyed color.

When I joined LHC I had light ash blond hair (dye) and started to grow it out. I now have about 8-9" of virgin growth (medium blond), all but 2-3" is strawberry blond from cassia/henna. There is a definite difference between the dyed hair and virgin hair where I used cassia/henna . One of the big reasons I have stopped using henna is I hated how it looks on my virgin hair (it also wasn't sticking well).

Be very very sure you want red hair, henna doesn't go away. I will be growing out the red for a long long time. It does make my hair feel nice but in the end I am a blond at heart and cassia is almost as nice (to me) as henna.

As to hennaing over bleach blond hair, yes it can be done. I never did straight henna on my hair but I did do a few test with it. On my dyed hair (you can see the color in my album) it turned a red/orange after 1 application. If you want to stay light/more copper by adding cassia there is more risk of going orange, so strand test your mix. Also like others have said the first few days after henna can be rather scary, mine was always quite orange for 3 days.

Oh and remember henna always kind of flairs orange in the sun

**CrystalStar** · April 8th, 2009, 02:58 PM

God, you wouldn't believe how much I regret bleaching my hair!

I'm hoping to achieve a burgandy-reddish tone by going over the bleached parts multiple times, I ordered 1kg of henna and I'm praying it'll be enough

Reckon if I get enough layers on it could possibly work? I hate to give up hope lol

**wintersun99** · April 8th, 2009, 04:20 PM

I wonder... would you be able to prepare for the eventual two-toned color you will get when your natural color begins to grow in, by trying to do henna saturation now? I mean, if you were to apply enough full-strength henna applications (and this may be many and you might need to do 1 with a mix of henna'indigo) to be fairly close to your natural hair color "level" by the time the roots start to grow in?

Just thinking out loud.

**CrystalStar** · April 8th, 2009, 11:49 PM

Ooo funny ya say that Winter, that's exactly what I was considering doing

I was thinking if I start with a Henndigo base and build up 3 or 4 layers of straight henna then hopefully I might be able to avoid the two-toned look

**wintersun99** · April 9th, 2009, 09:36 AM

Oh, good. I think that's the way I would do it, too. I think the henna'indigo base layer should help to avoid the flaming orange you might get over a bleach blond color. Have fun. Take lotsa pictures.

**CrystalStar** · April 9th, 2009, 10:48 AM

I already have my picture of my bleach blonde hair before using lush henna, and a picture of me with PLATINUM (shock

) hair, before I started using Cassia and it turned a more golden hue.

I'll try and take a picture after every phase, I gotta get some pictures up here eventually!

Thank you loads for the advice everyone who posted, my henna got lost in the mail though and is being re-sent now, kind of lucky so I didn't rush into it