subject: Choosing Your New Favorite Hair Color [print this page] Sometimes we all just need a change, and one of the best ways to change your whole look without spending thousands of dollars is to change your hair color. If you like your haircut very much but want to do something different with your hair anyway, changing your hair color is a great way to do that. Plus, with today's advances in coloring chemicals, coloring your hair - done correctly - isn't going to leave you with dry, brittle hair. In fact, you hair might even benefit from some of the better coloring products on the market.
The most difficult part of coloring your hair, though, is probably deciding what color to use. Picking the right color isn't too hard, but you do want to put some thought into it. If you choose the wrong color for your eye color and skin tone, the results could be pretty unattractive. You can, of course, always recolor your hair, but this trial-and-error method is very likely to leave you with that dry, brittle hair we mentioned earlier. As great as today's coloring products are, they're still not supposed to be used two or three times right in a row!
While you should take your eyes into account, your skin tone is the thing that will determine what hair color you should choose more than any other factor. Dying your hair strawberry blonde when your skin already has reddish undertones can leave you looking very red-faced, indeed. Find out what your underlying skin tone is - whether that's yellow, red, or whatever - and try to use your hair color to complement your skin tone.
You'll also want to take into account your skin's overall tone, which is either going to be cool or warm. If the veins behind your wrist look green, your complexion is warm, and if they look blue, your complexion is cool. If you have a warm complexion, you may want to use the richer colors like brunettes, honey blondes, and deep reds. If you have a cool skin tone, you could go with the extreme ends of the spectrum, including black and platinum blond. You may also want to bring out the warmth your skin does have with an ashy brown.
If you're still not sure what type of hair color to choose, try going with highlights or just using a dye that's a few shades off from your natural color. These less drastic options will still give you a change, but they are less likely to have terrible results.
