Pravana Color Review

I've been using regular Pravana color for quite some time now and it's okay. Nothing super special about it and nothing really terrible about it either.

I was dying my hair black for many years and would always use the Pravana 1V which was a beautiful color. It was a very rich deep dark black. I have used some of their other colors as well and the best thing I can say is that they are very predictable. You can use the same color a million times and it will almost always come out the same. 

One thing I don't like is their shades aren't anything special or nice. They're very basic natural shades that vary in their warmth and coolness. Their red shades have a lot of brown in them and don't really pop at all. It's a very nice line to enhance a natural shade but nothing you can really customize or have a lot of fun with. 

They do have some high lift blonde colors that work like a dream!! I have level 3 hair naturally and they got me up to about a level 8/9 in about 40 minutes and my hair felt great afterward!! Which is something hard to do with jumping that many levels in a single process. 

Overall I'm not very impressed with this color line mainly because of how amazing their vivids line is I definitely expected more out of the company as far as customization goes but it's a great basic predictable line which is never a bad thing!! 

Redken Shades EQ Review

So to follow up with my Redken color gels review I figured I'd also review the Redken Shades EQ line! 

This color line is for temporary use and comes in a variety of shades. They do lack a lot of natural tones and are mostly used to tone hair after highlights or to add some pigment back into the ends of hair that just needs a light refresh of color. They do have all levels from 1-9 with mostly 5, 6, & 7. There is also a variety of pigments to tone and compliment just about any hair color from a rich deep black to a white blonde. 

To use you can put on either highlights or blonde hair with just the color or you can mix it with Crystal Clear to dilute the color for a more subtle tone and watch it until it becomes the desired shade. To use as a stand alone mix the color how you normally would and leave on for approximately 25 minutes with 20 minutes under the dryer and 5 minutes to cool down. 

THESE SO NOT COVER GREY HAIR!!! THEY WILL GIVE A VERY BRIGHT PIGMENT ON GREY HAIR SO BE WARNED!! 

So now for the nitty gritty. I really do enjoy using these colors and they are quite true to swatch. They have a 9V that I use all the time on highlights. I normally use 1 oz Crystal Clear, 1/2 oz 9V and 1 1/2 oz solution for just a couple minutes on light highlights and it comes out so beautiful! Always remember to dilute the cool tone colors especially if using a light level as they have VERY powerful pigments and will turn the hair purple, blue or green so be careful!! 

As for the dark tones, they are very nice for just a simple refresh but do not last very long in the hair. They usually rinse out pretty quickly so if your doing a virgin all over color with it just make sure you tell your client that it will only last for about a month before most of the color is out of their hair. 

Now for the bad, their reds and coppers only last about 2 washes. I know that these shades normally don't last long to begin with but when I used it on my hair and my copper highlights were already gone after a single wash and I was left with a nasty level 8 undertone I was very disappoint. My advise done use it to tone red or copper hair unless that is there natural or you use some type of filler or added booster color to it to enhance the shade. 

Hope this was helpful!! 

Redken Color Gels Review

So this is the main color line that I work with in the salon all the time so I do have a lot of experience with it. There are definitely some good and bad things about this color line and unfortunately the bad does out weigh the good quite a bit. 

So to start out with this line has a very hard time covering gray hair. Only a few of the shades will cover and leaves you with very little customization. And even though they say they cover gray hair,the majority  of the time they come out pretty transparent. The colors also seem to fade out quite quickly and never tend to be that true to swatch. Using this color line is very much so a trial and error process unfortunately. You'll have to try on every client a certain shade (because they all turn out completely different on everyone) and just kinda hope for the best I hate to say. 

Some good parts are some of the shades are quite beautiful as long as you're not covering grey hair. They're reds and coppers and very beautiful and most of their blondes are as well especially their cool blonde shades. 

All together I wouldn't recommend this color line very much so due to its unpredictability. But if you are doing a virgin hair application with very little to no grey hair then by all means use it! Just be careful with it!

Manic Panic Color Review

Let me start off by saying I've been using manic panic color for almost 10 years now! It is by far my favorite fashion color line not only for the wide variety of colors but the ease of use and the guaranteed results.

Manic Panic comes in just about every color imaginable and you can even mix colors together to create you're own custom shade! Now for each color you do have to lift your hair up a certain amount, some more then others. But even if you don't lift it up as light as intended you will still get some result of a similar shade on your hair allowing you to customize even further.

The consistency of the color is very creamy and stays moist on the hair which is perfect for ultimate saturation. You leave it on for about 20-40 minutes depending on how bright you want and how long you want it to last and you can also put t under heat for a more intense result as well.

I've never had a problem using these colors and everything comes out true to swatch. A little tip I picked up along the way is if you mix the color with a little 10 volume developer it does tend to stay in a little while longer then the couple weeks the dye normally lasts.

As for getting it to last longer, it normal lasts about 2-3 weeks if not more depending on how much you wash your hair. To get it to last longer don't use a lot of heat on your hair and also try not to wash it as often. You can also put some in your conditioner to help keep it fresh before your next touch up.

Splat Hair Color Review

There's a lot of different color lines out there for fashion colors. Splat is one of those lines

I do enjoy the splat color line. The colors are very bright and vivid in the hair. They are very true to the color that is depicted. I have not tried all the colors in the line however but I have been very happy with the colors that I have tried.

That being said, I do have a lot of negatives that go along with this line. The color itself is EXTREAMLY messy. It is very liquidy and gets everywhere!! It stains in about 2 seconds of being on your skin. It is definitely not an easy color to work with. It also dries out on the hair as well making it hard to figure out if the hair is saturated enough.

Most colors have a desired level that you need to achieve in order to get the best look for the shade. For this line, the hair needs to be a pale yellow or white, even for the Reds which is insane. It is definitely more damaging to the hair to use splat then it is to just find another color line.

The bleach that comes with the color is also very liquidy and doesn't even lift that well at all. It was also very hard to mix and not all of the bleach power mixes with the included peroxide.


Final thoughts: if you have very light virgin hair then this is definitely the color line for you. But if you do have any color on your hair and if it's dark (naturally or unnaturally) then please pick another color line before you burn your hair off.

When to work

So if you've been a hairdresser for awhile then you know the importance of working certain hours. It takes sometime when you start at a new salon to figure out what your busy days and times are going to be. You also want to set up your schedule accordingly as to not inconvenience many of any of your clients.

I've learned that working weekends is definitely bennificial to you and your clients. A lot of my clients come in on Saturday when I work and that is also the day I make the most of my money. I only work about 25 hours a week and I make about as much if not the same as those of my coworkers that work 40 hours a week. The reason for this isn't because I have a very big book but it's due to the fact that I work the "busy days"

I work Wednesday to Saturday no more then 8 hours a day and it is fantastic. I have a lovely 3 day weekend which gets me relaxed and motivated to work through those busy four days.

Then again it's all about what works best for you but I've always been one for working smarter not harder :)