Talk to me about henna hair dye and offer tips please!

[Anonymous]

Sick of the grey hair. Want a more natural alternative. Want to do it myself at home. Need tips on doing henna hair dye at home! Thanks in advance!

[Anonymous]

i have no tips only warnings--the color over gray may have a different undertone or take differently than on darker hair. sometimes black dye has a greenish cast, for instance.
also i have been told that you can't strip henna (only dye over it). make sure you test it before you do your whole head.

[Anonymous]

Warning - traditional henna color typically produces a reddish color. Also, as pp mentioned, it's very difficult to color over it. And it doesn't last that long. My mom uses it and has to color her hair every two weeks.

[Anonymous]

I've been dying my hair with henna for going on 3 years now, and really love it. The trick is to use high-quality henna--not the stuff that you see on the shelves of some of the crunchier grocery stores. I order mine from www.mehandi.com , which also has extensive directions on how it's used. Results can vary significantly from person to person, because the henna dye binds to the keratin in your hair, and everyone's hair has a slightly different keratin content. The individual hairs on your head will also differ in how much dye they absorb, which means that you don't get any sort of monochrome color--you get something varied and more natural-looking.

Henna is PERMANENT. For the PP whose mom needs to dye every 2 weeks, perhaps she's doing this because her roots grow, or perhaps she's using cheap drugstore henna that's adulterated with other substances. The first week after you dye, the color will darken & mature a bit, but this is not fading. Don't use henna expecting to be able to wash it out--it's there for good.

Henna is also a red dye (although mehandi.com does sell pure henna with less dye occurring naturally). The big danger to using henna is that in some hair, it can bring out magenta highlights. I wish I'd done it first with a lower dye-content variety, and had left it in my hair for a shorter period, because I did get some magenta the first time, and it really bugged me. Now I'm getting a more orange/auburn color (just tried the "Henna for African hair" variety from Mehandi, which is a lower dye content; it's day three after the dye and the results seem gentle, though they could still darken over the next day or two).