How to fix a brassy ombré?

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Sofiq

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Hi, I'm a young hairdresser that mostly do haircuts and beard grooming, so I'm a bit insecure when it comes to hair colouring sometimes and I need your advice!

My hair is a nice and gradient ombré, but one thing that bothers me is that the middle part is really brassy.
A year ago I bleached my hair to get rid of my previously red hair, so I was left with a peachy level 8-9. Since I wanted to grow out my natural hair colour (ashy level 4-5) I bleached the ends and toned them to a level 9-10 and put a cool brown level 5 on top. I had the ends bleached one more time after this as well.
Later on I wanted to try balayage, and since I didn't want to do it on myself I went to the salon next door and had her do it for me, but unfortunately it came out a bit too unnatural for my liking (the highlights were too thick and it basically looked like regular foils with outgrowth).
This summer I tried balayage again and had another colleague do it for me, and we used Wella freelights and Olaplex but it didn't really lift that well and the hair took quite a lot of damage.

Now I'm stuck with so many different tones in my hair... My ends are silver/grey, the middle part is brassy and my natural outgrowth is an ashy level 4-5. I've tried different toners and treatments but the brassy middle part is incredibly stubborn. If I bleach my ends again they will literally fall off.

Any thoughts? I've been thinking of maybe trying a high lift colour like Wella 12/ and "move up" my ombré, since one of my colleagues recommended those (but I'm not sure since they're supposed to be used on virgin hair). I also would like to avoid to put any colour/bleach on my ends.

Thank you in advance x
 

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If your hair is damaged, please do not put any more chemicals on it until you've restored the health back in.

What products are you using at the moment? You need a good balance of protein and moisture. Too much protein will absorb what moisture is Left causing more damage

If you can get hold of it try Philip Kingsley Elastisizor pre shampoo treatment
 
I agree with KHS.

I wouldn't touch it if its really damaged.

But for future reference your natural colour is nowhere near a 4 its a 6.
 
If your hair is damaged, please do not put any more chemicals on it until you've restored the health back in.

What products are you using at the moment? You need a good balance of protein and moisture. Too much protein will absorb what moisture is Left causing more damage

If you can get hold of it try Philip Kingsley Elastisizor pre shampoo treatment

Thank you for your reply!

I use gentle schampoo and conditioner from Cutrin and I use two different hair masks from Schwarzkopf, one to repair and one to restore moisture. I also use Wella Luxe Oil or Moroccan hair oils. The natural hair is in good condition and the brassy part is not that bad, but the ends will forever be damaged until I cut them off since there's been some breakage.

If a client asked for me to fix this I would probably offer keratin treatment and tell her to use silver schampoo and let her hair rest, but since it's my own hair I'm less careful. I have had many cuts and styles and I wouldn't mind cutting it all off if it suffers too much damage.

I also want to learn how to correct this since I want to be a better hairdresser, not just because I'm tired of my own hair.
 
Thank you for your reply!

I use gentle schampoo and conditioner from Cutrin and I use two different hair masks from Schwarzkopf, one to repair and one to restore moisture. I also use Wella Luxe Oil or Moroccan hair oils. The natural hair is in good condition and the brassy part is not that bad, but the ends will forever be damaged until I cut them off since there's been some breakage.

If a client asked for me to fix this I would probably offer keratin treatment and tell her to use silver schampoo and let her hair rest, but since it's my own hair I'm less careful. I have had many cuts and styles and I wouldn't mind cutting it all off if it suffers too much damage.

I also want to learn how to correct this since I want to be a better hairdresser, not just because I'm tired of my own hair.

I hear you, but I wouldn't attempt this on your own. Lots of experienced hairdressers on here won't do their own hair, its just not practical.
 
I agree with KHS.

I wouldn't touch it if its really damaged.

But for future reference your natural colour is nowhere near a 4 its a 6.

Thank you for your reply!

Like I answered to KHS I'm not just interested for the sake of my own hair, I also simply want to learn.

My hair is a level 4 now after the summer, during winter it gets darker again to a level 5. The image I posted isn't great because the true colours don't show, but I wanted to demonstrate the contrast of the brassy part. Sorry!
 
I hear you, but I wouldn't attempt this on your own. Lots of experienced hairdressers on here won't do their own hair, its just not practical.

Well, I sure can agree that it's not practical to do your own hair.
 
Well, I sure can agree that it's not practical to do your own hair.

Are you fully qualified or did you leave early?

You may want to go on some colour courses if you want to learn!
 
Are you fully qualified or did you leave early?

You may want to go on some colour courses if you want to learn!

I am fully qualified but since I already had a career I attended "evening classes" and there was not much room for extra tips and tricks when it comes to hair colouring. I would love to attend some colour courses but I basically live in the middle of nowhere so it would have to be online then ;)

Regarding the topic on getting brassy out of hair I've already tried the methods I know (different toners, mostly Wella) but not much seems to work or last longer than a few days. I'm considering just waiting for the hair to regain strength and then put a light ashy brown on top of it and carefully blend it towards the root and the ends.
 
I am fully qualified but since I already had a career I attended "evening classes" and there was not much room for extra tips and tricks when it comes to hair colouring. I would love to attend some colour courses but I basically live in the middle of nowhere so it would have to be online then ;)

Regarding the topic on getting brassy out of hair I've already tried the methods I know (different toners, mostly Wella) but not much seems to work or last longer than a few days. I'm considering just waiting for the hair to regain strength and then put a light ashy brown on top of it and carefully blend it towards the root and the ends.

The ends aren't so bad are they its just the midlengths that are brassy.

If you've been toning it all with the same formula, then there is your problem. You need to approach the midlengths and the roots separately.

You can only tone to what the hair is lifted to, example midlengths are a 7-8, you can't tone the with anything lighter as the pigment in the colour isn't saturated enough to neutralise at a lower level. (As depth gets lighter, the tone becomes less pigmented)
 
Brassy in my mind, implies that there's red present in the mid sections? Levels 7/8 would read more orangy. If there is a red depth to the unwanted tone, you're probably dealing with a level 6, and will need to tone at a level 6 to take care of any red tones. Albeit, red is such a pain to "tone" and ends up usually just reading dark I feel like.
 
I am fully qualified but since I already had a career I attended "evening classes" and there was not much room for extra tips and tricks when it comes to hair colouring. I would love to attend some colour courses but I basically live in the middle of nowhere so it would have to be online then ;)

Regarding the topic on getting brassy out of hair I've already tried the methods I know (different toners, mostly Wella) but not much seems to work or last longer than a few days. I'm considering just waiting for the hair to regain strength and then put a light ashy brown on top of it and carefully blend it towards the root and the ends.
Just saw your attached photo. Although it does read quite light, I would consider using a demi-permenant level 7 and adding a touch of a level 6 to your formula. Where the brassy meets your root color, a red depth appears, and I don't think a 7 would take care of the warmth on it own. Adding a quarter to a half of 6 would give you a bit more opaqueness to your formula.
 
The ends aren't so bad are they its just the midlengths that are brassy.

If you've been toning it all with the same formula, then there is your problem. You need to approach the midlengths and the roots separately.

You can only tone to what the hair is lifted to, example midlengths are a 7-8, you can't tone the with anything lighter as the pigment in the colour isn't saturated enough to neutralise at a lower level. (As depth gets lighter, the tone becomes less pigmented)

I think that my problem might be that then, that I've used toners with not enough pigment. Was scared to tone it with something "too dark" earlier to ruin the gradient effect. The first time I used same toner all over but last time I used an 8, but it didn't last for long so I will try a 7 next time. Thank you for your help x
 
Just saw your attached photo. Although it does read quite light, I would consider using a demi-permenant level 7 and adding a touch of a level 6 to your formula. Where the brassy meets your root color, a red depth appears, and I don't think a 7 would take care of the warmth on it own. Adding a quarter to a half of 6 would give you a bit more opaqueness to your formula.

Yeah my old red is incredibly stubborn even though I did a round of colour build up remover and had my hair coloured to an ashy mid brown a couple of months before I bleached it the first time. I am ordering more colours tonight so I will definitely try what you suggested, thank you so much for your advice!
 
Yeah my old red is incredibly stubborn even though I did a round of colour build up remover and had my hair coloured to an ashy mid brown a couple of months before I bleached it the first time. I am ordering more colours tonight so I will definitely try what you suggested, thank you so much for your advice!
If anything, just the 6 in the formula right through that base transition, then a 7 everywhere like @cams97 suggested, so you can keep your gradient feel!
 
If anything, just the 6 in the formula right through that base transition, then a 7 everywhere like @cams97 suggested, so you can keep your gradient feel!

Will do, will update with progress later on. Again, thank you!
 
Mids look a 7 on that picture
 

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