u/strawberrywritess

Hi! I really need some advice because I messed up bleaching my hair at home and I'm getting completely different answers from the salons in my area, and all of them have given me really unprofessional advice.

My natural hair is very dark brown, almost black, around level 2-3, and I had previously used L'Oréal Casting Crème Gloss on it 3 months ago, which had faded quite a bit before I bleached it.

I recently bleached my hair because my goal was a medium/light-medium neutral brown, around level 5-6, I don't want blonde hair and I don't want dark brown/black hair. I basically wanted to lift my naturally very dark hair enough that I could then tone/color it into a softer neutral or slightly cool medium brown. The problem is that my hair lifted VERY unevenly. Some sections are now around level 5-6 and extremely orange/brassy. Other sections are medium/ dark brown, and I still have some very dark/near-black bands and strands, especially underneath and toward the back. My virgin regrowth/front lifted much faster than some of the previously colored lengths.

I went to a salon and asked if they could selectively lighten ONLY the remaining very dark sections so that the underlying levels were closer together, while avoiding bleach overlap on the sections that are already light enough.
The stylist told me that wasn't necessary and that they could just put one hair color over my whole head and it would become even. This is the part I don't understand. If some of the dark sections contain old artificial color and are genuinely several levels darker than the orange sections, wouldn't putting one level 5-6 brown dye over everything mostly deposit color onto the already-light sections while leaving the darkest previously colored sections significantly darker?

I understand that an all-over brown could make the hair look more blended by DARKENING the lighter/orange sections, but I specifically do NOT want to go back to really dark brown. My goal is a medium brunette. I like approximately how light my lighter sections are now (maybe would want just a tiny bit darker); I just hate the orange/brassy tone and want the remaining dark pieces brought closer to that level.
My eventual goal is one visually even level 5-6 neutral/slightly cool medium brown - not orange/copper, not red, not extremely ashy/grey, and not dark brown.

So my questions are:

Can one all-over permanent/demi color genuinely make hair with this much difference in starting levels look like one level 5-6 brown without first correcting the darkest pieces?

If the darkest pieces contain previous artificial color, wouldn't "color doesn't lift color" apply here?

Would the normal professional approach be to selectively lift/color-remove ONLY the genuinely dark sections until the levels are reasonably close, then use a neutral/cool brunette formula to even the tone?

Is there another professional technique that could get everything to my target level without bleaching the already-light sections again?

If I ultimately color it around level 5-6, would you use mostly neutral/natural brown with some ash/cool pigment to neutralize the orange rather than straight ash?

I'm attaching pictures showing my hair normally and also with the layers separated so you can see how much darker some of the underneath sections are.

Hi! I really need some advice because I messed up bleaching my hair at home and I'm getting completely different answers from the salons in my area, and all of them have given me really unprofessional advice.

My natural hair is very dark brown, almost black, around level 2-3, and I had previously used L'Oréal Casting Crème Gloss on it 3 months ago, which had faded quite a bit before I bleached it. I recently bleached my hair because my goal was a medium/light-medium neutral brown, around level 5-6, I don't want blonde hair and I don't want dark brown/black hair. I basically wanted to lift my naturally very dark hair enough that I could then tone/color it into a softer neutral or slightly cool medium brown. The problem is that my hair lifted VERY unevenly. Some sections are now around level 5-6 and extremely orange/brassy. Other sections are medium/ dark brown, and I still have some very dark/near-black bands and strands, especially underneath and toward the back. My virgin regrowth/front lifted much faster than some of the previously colored lengths.

I went to a salon and asked if they could selectively lighten ONLY the remaining very dark sections so that the underlying levels were closer together, while avoiding bleach overlap on the sections that are already light enough.
The stylist told me that wasn't necessary and that they could just put one hair color over my whole head and it would become even. This is the part I don't understand. If some of the dark sections contain old artificial color and are genuinely several levels darker than the orange sections, wouldn't putting one level 5-6 brown dye over everything mostly deposit color onto the already-light sections while leaving the darkest previously colored sections significantly darker? I understand that an all-over brown could make the hair look more blended by DARKENING the lighter/orange sections, but I specifically do NOT want to go back to really dark brown.

My goal is a medium brunette. I like approximately how light my lighter sections are now (maybe would want just a tiny bit darker); I just hate the orange/brassy tone and want the remaining dark pieces brought closer to that level. My eventual goal is one visually even level 5-6 neutral/slightly cool medium brown - not orange/copper, not red, not extremely ashy/grey, and not dark brown.

So my questions are:

Can one all-over permanent/demi color genuinely make hair with this much difference in starting levels look like one level 5-6 brown without first correcting the darkest pieces?

If the darkest pieces contain previous artificial color, wouldn't "color doesn't lift color" apply here?

Would the normal professional approach be to selectively lift/color-remove ONLY the genuinely dark sections until the levels are reasonably close, then use a neutral/cool brunette formula to even the tone?

Is there another professional technique that could get everything to my target level without bleaching the already-light sections again?

If I ultimately color it around level 5-6, would you use mostly neutral/natural brown with some ash/cool pigment to neutralize the orange rather than straight ash?

I'm attaching pictures showing my hair normally and also with the layers separated so you can see how much darker some of the underneath sections are.

Hi! I really need some advice because I messed up bleaching my hair at home and I’m getting completely different answers from the salons in my area, and all of them have given me really unprofessional advice.

My natural hair is very dark brown, almost black, around level 2–3, and I had previously used L’Oréal Casting Crème Gloss on it 3 months ago, which had faded quite a bit before I bleached it.

I recently bleached my hair because my goal was a medium/light-medium neutral brown, around level 5-6, I don’t want blonde hair and I don’t want dark brown/black hair. I basically wanted to lift my naturally very dark hair enough that I could then tone/color it into a softer neutral or slightly cool medium brown. The problem is that my hair lifted VERY unevenly. Some sections are now around level 5–6 and extremely orange/brassy. Other sections are medium/dark brown, and I still have some very dark/near-black bands and strands, especially underneath and toward the back. My virgin regrowth/front lifted much faster than some of the previously colored lengths.

I went to a salon and asked if they could selectively lighten ONLY the remaining very dark sections so that the underlying levels were closer together, while avoiding bleach overlap on the sections that are already light enough. The stylist told me that wasn’t necessary and that they could just put one hair color over my whole head and it would become even. This is the part I don’t understand. If some of the dark sections contain old artificial color and are genuinely several levels darker than the orange sections, wouldn’t putting one level 5–6 brown dye over everything mostly deposit color onto the already-light sections while leaving the darkest previously colored sections significantly darker?

I understand that an all-over brown could make the hair look more blended by DARKENING the lighter/orange sections, but I specifically do NOT want to go back to really dark brown. My goal is a medium brunette. I like approximately how light my lighter sections are now (maybe would want just a tiny bit darker) ; I just hate the orange/brassy tone and want the remaining dark pieces brought closer to that level.
My eventual goal is one visually even level 5–6 neutral/slightly cool medium brown — not orange/copper, not red, not extremely ashy/grey, and not dark brown.

So my questions are:

Can one all-over permanent/demi color genuinely make hair with this much difference in starting levels look like one level 5–6 brown without first correcting the darkest pieces?

If the darkest pieces contain previous artificial color, wouldn’t “color doesn’t lift color” apply here?

Would the normal professional approach be to selectively lift/color-remove ONLY the genuinely dark sections until the levels are reasonably close, then use a neutral/cool brunette formula to even the tone?

Is there another professional technique that could get everything to my target level without bleaching the already-light sections again?

If I ultimately color it around level 5–6, would you use mostly neutral/natural brown with some ash/cool pigment to neutralize the orange rather than straight ash?

I’m attaching pictures showing my hair normally and also with the layers separated so you can see how much darker some of the underneath sections are.