Learned & Still Learning
When we returned to Ireland, we moved in with my parents until we got a place of our own. It was a lovely time spending so much time with them and I took the opportunity to clear out a few cupboards (or presses as we call them in Ireland). What I found was amazing, there […]
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Recently I was contacted by a pal who is currently working on an Education Program for Hairdressers in his part of the world. We had an interesting conversation and a bit of a debate about the importance of the different bonds in the hair. It’s a subject that has resurfaced in the last decade along […]
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In my previous blog I shared some lifestyle tips supported with expert’s links on managing our own mental health. In this blog I continue the theme of mental health taking a different perspective in how to help others. When I started working in the salon as an apprentice, I was a little chatterbox and loved […]
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Here we are 2021 and feeling a little Déjà vu as we enter yet another lockdown. There is some hope on the horizon with the roll out of COVID-19 vaccines all over the world and we will adapt to living with this virus. As a ‘non-essential’ business the hair & beauty industry has been hit […]
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After the year that was 2020, who can say what 2021 has in store for us? And although we faced may changes there is something nice about things that stay the same and this is true for the team at the Pantone institute as they last week announced not one but two colours of the […]
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You see it called out on hair products, written in articles, discussed among friends or even experienced it yourself when a Professional as in my case looks at your hair a tells you with pity you have fine hair or if lucky something else. Yes, hair comes in a variety of different sizes as well […]
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I am back designing education this time for the Moroccanoil brand and revisited the subject of the hair’s layers. It is one of the first hair theories we learn as a Professional, but its only through experience that we realise its importance as it helps to explain why things happen. Even recently during a coaching […]
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You’ve probably heard about it, possibly seen it or you may have experienced it yourself; that strange cast of green that reflects from the hair. It can happen anyone, at any age, any texture and with or without an artificial hair colour. The only common factor is swimming in a chlorinated pool or in the […]
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Hairdressing has been the one constant in my life, I remember smells from sitting on the salon floor chewing hairpins as my Mum worked on elaborate creations, telling a little white lie about my age to my aunt to get a Saturday job in her salons when I was only 12 and that sickly nervous […]
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Henna has had a recent resurgence in the use of hair colouring and I was also pleased to read it is being looked at more closely in textile dying as it is a less-toxic approach to filling our lives with colourful cloth and yarn. Although a natural dye it does have its challenges for both […]
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It has been wonderful watching the different Hair Professionals all over the world getting back to work, doing what we love to do, HAIR. In this blog getting back to hair I wanted to continue on my earlier themes of beauty industry changes, little did I know I’d be adding to it so soon. These […]
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In my previous blogs I discussed the hair’s structure and melanin, in this blog I will take a look at the texture of hair, that is, the straightness and waviness of hair. When it comes to physically working with strong textured hair I am not as proficient as I would like to be. Although having […]
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As a child I was fascinated by how different everyone looked and I was particularly interesting in one of my Hockey team mates who had heterochromia iridum; heter (different) chromia (colour) iridum (iris), yes two different eye colours, I thought she was the most exotic person in my world. Later I learned that all of […]
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Hair! Our bodies are covered in it, we spend a lot of time, money and effort on it and it can communicate volumes about us to others. In this blog I look more closely at the hair fibre what it is made of and share some interesting facts about hair, OK I think they are […]
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You’ve done it, you’ve helped someone or you yourself have grown out your artificial hair colour and now you want to make sure your natural grey/white hair looks great. In this blog I look at the changes in grey/white hair and share ideas on how to maintain and keep grey/white hair looking great and healthy. […]
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Making a decision to grow out your hair colour to your natural grey/white hair is big one. For some that process is more gradual taking several years which can include an emotional adjustment to the new brighter look. For others it is a dramatic transformation that takes place in the hands of a Professional colourist. […]
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My years working in research taught me more than just what was happening in the beauty industry, it often demonstrated my limited awareness of things. Over the 16 years in R&D that awareness grew and expanded as I learned to open up and assimilate new truths as they appeared. In this blog, my third instalment […]
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While working in research a large part of my job was to assess how the beauty industry was changing, the insights generated helped to inform my actions and recommendations. I am sharing with you in this blog my second installment of what I have witnessed in Retail/Box colour and like in my previous Professional colourist […]
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As a beauty Professional I have been a keen observer of how technology and developments in both product and education have pushed the industry in recent years. When I worked in research a large part of my job was to assess how the beauty industry was changing, the insights generated helped to inform my actions […]
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This blog shares my approach when working colour correction specifically on Box/Retail Colour. This is not something I shy away from and neither should any Professional, once you apply a methodology to your approach. Admittedly the colour work I do today is primarily colour correction. It is something I love to do and allows me […]
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I have wanted to write this blog for a while, and having worked on both professional and retail brands of colour I would like to approach this topic from an and/and rather than an either/or perspective. As a chemist my formulation approach is similar in the lab whether it is Professional or Retail colour. However […]
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As we all hunker down and do our bit to protect others, the health systems and ourselves many Professionals myself included are faced with and sometimes literally through technology clients, friends and family starting to show their true colours. Many will carry on as normal and leave their roots to grow out not bothered by […]
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There are so many brands of colour available not only from different manufactures but also from the same manufacturers. It’s a daunting task trying to select a shade just right for your own hair and it is an even more daunting task if as a Professional you need or want move from one colour range […]
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It’s a very good question, why do I need to know about pH? and one that has been asked by several of my hairdressing pals, so this blog is for you and anybody else who’s interested. Don’t worry; fortunately, through the combination of knowledge, product development and even regulations you can blissfully practice your Professional […]
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When I first bleached my hair, I noticed a lot of changes and without really thinking it through I slowly adapted with plenty of mistakes along the way. In this blog I am going to share some of the things I’ve discovered and learned for giving bleached hair some TLC. I would be lying if […]
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There are so many ways bleach can be used to lighten hair and in the hands of a well-trained and experienced professional the results are true head turners. Working with Bleach is an art form that also requires an understanding of biology (the hair itself), physics (how colour is perceived and manipulated) and chemistry (how […]
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Bleaching, is one of the older, unchanging and simplest method of altering the hair’s natural colour and involves decolouring either part of, or all of the hair’s natural melanin. It is also still to date the most effective way to lighten artificial hair colours. The bleaching process progressively lightens until finally white or blonde shades […]
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Every Hair & Beauty product has an ingredient list by law, usually printed in the smallest font possible (thanks, packaging folk). The intent of this blog is to inform on what an INCI is rather than how to decipher one. What is INCI? INCI names (International Nomenclature Cosmetic Ingredient) are systematic names internationally recognised […]
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This is officially the number one question I get asked, once someone has worked out that I am a Hairdresser and my response ‘as often as you feel the need to’, it’s not that I am being flippant it’s just that it is a loaded question. Let me explain, we are all different, with different […]
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Oxidising hair dyes are still today the most popular form of hair colouring either Professionally or in Retail, you only have to walk into the hair colouring section of any outlet to witness the volume of choice. Their popularity is down to the reliability, effectiveness and resistance to shampooing and other external factors, such as […]
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On the spectrum of colours, the most effective category for covering white hair and for changing the natural hair colour is Permanent Hair Colour. In my first blog on colouring grey/white hair I looked at one of the mildest; semi-permanent hair colour that sits on and slightly within the hair washing out completely after several […]
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In my first blog on colouring grey/white hair I looked at Semi-Permanent colour and its power to blend those first white hairs, here I move to the next level with Demi-permanent colour. During our greying progress we will start to notice that those first few grey/white unruly hairs start to make more of a […]
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Each season the team at the Pantone Color Institute creates the Pantone Fashion Color Trend Report; a color overview highlighting the top colors fashion designers showing at NY Fashion Week will be featuring in their collections for the upcoming season. With color on the catwalk a key indicator of the color stories we can expect […]
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In my first post on hair loss I looked at two genetic types Androgenic Alopecia and Involutional Alopecia (aka aging). In my second post on hair loss I further explored genetic predisposed types; Alopecia Areata, Alopecia Universalis and Telogen Effluvium the latter of which I suffer from myself. My third post on hair loss looked […]
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In my first post on hair loss I looked at two genetic types Androgenic Alopecia and Involutional Alopecia (aka aging). In my second post on hair loss I further explored genetic predisposed types; Alopecia Areata, Alopecia Universalis and Telogen Effluvium. Here I will cover three types that I have become increasingly aware of through clients, […]
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In my first post on hair loss I looked at two genetic types of hair loss, Androgenic Alopecia patterned baldness and Involutional Alopecia (aka aging). Here I will explore three further types that yes, our genes can predisposition us to, but they may or may not manifest themselves and if they do, they can be […]
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While working in Istanbul I was amazed by the number of men walking around with headbands, the hotel lobby was full of them as were the restaurants and shops. It finally dawned on me that Istanbul is a widely recognised centre for reasonably priced hair transplants and that those headbands were not a fashion statement […]
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Semi-Permanent colours are the fastest growing category of colour over the past five years, mainly due to the rise of the funky bold tones we see across Social Media. I am a fan and have always been, my own hair playing testimony to that, with regular changes from violet, to purple, to denim to grey […]
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When we discover our first grey/white hair we all react differently, for me, I was very curious as it would finally allow me to experience for myself something that I had studied and worked through for others. Over the years I have experimented on my own hair, as well as developing products and techniques for […]
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Welcome to the first in a series of blogs that look at grey hair and some ideas on what to do about it. I think white/grey hair is one of those universal truths, we all experience it to some degree in our lives and at some point, have to make a decision what to do […]
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I always found it amazing to think that every single hair on our body has its own unique genetic programming. During our lives our genetic programming influences our hormones and that in turn effects the individual hair. Some of our hairs grow fine; these downy hairs known as Vellus hair cover the majority of our […]
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Hairy Resolutions 2019 Starting a New Year can feel really good, wiping the slate clean and starting afresh. I probably have a lot of the same kind of resolutions as many of you have; eat better, exercise more, hug friends and family for longer and often. This year I am adding 11 Hairy Resolutions, putting […]
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Pantone has always been my go-to source for technical colour inspiration, especially when formulating a colour. Not only do they categorise thousands of colours with beautiful descriptions, they conduct research into colour and predict each year a new direction. Their annual colour of the year is a great way to find that new personal twist […]
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Here we are at the latter half of January with the promise of spring just around the corner. There’s something so comforting about the clean slate that January and a new calendar offers. It’s a chance to begin again, to put aside whatever disappointments we’ve had lately and work toward a bright and shiny new […]
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