Bleaching my hair white, not blonde.

Dak

So I'm looking to bleach my hair white. I've bleached it before, to dye it blue, but the thing is I always bought my bleach from Shoppers Drug Mart, and all the bleach packages there make my hair blond - a very light blond, but blond none the less. How do I bleach my hair white? Is there a special brand? Do I have to get it professionally done, which would be dumb?

Do I just keep bleaching the hair over and over until it's white? I have extremely thick hair, so this is actually viable option, but someone told me the packages have a little dye mixed into the bleach? I don't know, help me out with this.

Gray and silver count as white, I guess?

Rook

Dak wrote:

So I'm looking to bleach my hair white. I've bleached it before, to dye it blue, but the thing is I always bought my bleach from Shoppers Drug Mart, and all the bleach packages there make my hair blond - a very light blond, but blond none the less. How do I bleach my hair white? Is there a special brand? Do I have to get it professionally done, which would be dumb?

Do I just keep bleaching the hair over and over until it's white? I have extremely thick hair, so this is actually viable option, but someone told me the packages have a little dye mixed into the bleach? I don't know, help me out with this.

Gray and silver count as white, I guess?

You can use a white toner like this

Dak

Where would I be able to buy something like that? I never see it that kind of stuff in department stores/pharmacies.

Am i looking hard enough

Fawkes

Just a warning, it's bloody difficult to do if your hair is naturally dark, and results are definitely variable.

I had to do it once for a theatre thing, took about 5 sessions of bleaching it over one day; warning, your hair may be able to take more, your scalp almost certainly will not. I had to stop before my head fell off. Also bear in mind your hair will have the consistency of cardboard after that much bleaching.

That only got it down to a light Scottish ginger, a la:



So I then had to buy some silver tint stuff, and drown myself in that. This almost worked, but within a day or two the silver started turning purpleish in normal light - luckily I got away with it under stage lighting, but looked interesting the rest of the time.

Seriously consider whether you can actually do this, if as I am assuming, you want this for everyday, and get advice from a makeup pro (not some woman in a drugstore, good quality hair salon or theatrical makeup shop). Getting it done by a professional would be advisable. If you do go ahead solo, buy proper dye from a film makeup shop, there are some online if you are in a small town.

Szechuanosaurus

Professional hairdressers will bleach you hair white and then add a toner, IIRC. They'll generally let you choose the toner and probably recommend one that will compliment your complexion, although usually it's some very light shade of blonde. The general reason for this is that pure-white hair just looks odd and isn't usually a desirable effect. If anything, it'll probably end up looking a very light blue in natural light due to not having any tone of itself. I guess pre-packaged bleaches are probably pre-treated with toner.

If you have very dark hair, it may also simply be the case that you can't get it pure white simply due to how dark it is. AFAIK, there's no real way around that except to be born blonde.

Don't keep bleaching it over and over, from what I understand that tends to turn in green or blue or at the very least will simply damage it and if the bleach is pre-treated with a toner you aren't going to get it bleach white no matter how often you use it.

I'd say what you really want to do is get a bleach with a very, very light toner so that to all intents and purposes it looks white but won't go funny depending on the lighting but if you have extremely dark hair it near-white might just not be an option at all. If you don't have any success yourself, make an appointment and go talk to a pro-hairdresser about it.

Bionic Monkey

Good luck man. I tried this many years ago, and had absolutely no luck. Got my hair bleached professionally and everything.`As far as I could tell, it just wasn't possible.

Menthol

http://www.43things.com/entries/view/1353478

crake

Just get it done at a salon. Will save you a ton of trouble and scalp/hair damage. It'll be worth the money (which shouldn't be too bad if you don't get a cut or style - price around a bit)

Air

i normally go to this korean place to get my hair cut or colored

i was thinkin of getting white/silver highlights too but went for somethin else instead

but on the thing they bring out with all the colours to choose from, they did have silver on there

and since koreans always got black hair im sure they have some idea how to actually pull it off

squeefish

I've gotten my hair bleached at a salon many, many times, and it never ends up pure white - just extremely light blonde. I wanted white once, so I bought white toner, but just to warn you, that stuff tends to make your hair look more silvery than white (I was rather disappointed). White toner isn't exactly the easiest stuff in the world to find, so you might have to search a bit - I buy mine at a place that specializes in punk clothes/accessories.

And it is so very much easier to get it done somewhere than to do it yourself. Really, it's worth the extra money to go in knowing you'll get what you want, as opposed to ruining your hair by being cheap :P

Good luck! I'm a big fan of adventurous hair.

Szechuanosaurus

squeefish wrote:

And it is so very much easier to get it done somewhere than to do it yourself. Really, it's worth the extra money to go in knowing you'll get what you want, as opposed to ruining your hair by being cheap :P

Good luck! I'm a big fan of adventurous hair.

I used to love getting my hair bleached. Make an occasion of it, go to a fancier salon, take a book or some magazines, take them up on their offer of coffee, chill out for an hour.