How to get green out of hair?
I dyed my hair blonde, and it has now turned green. How do I get this out?
Why did my hair turn green? How to get rid of green hair? These are probably the two most frequent questions readers send us during vacation time. However, hair turning green is a very common thing for all seasons and hair colors!
Not only blonde hair can turn green after swimming in the pool or bad bleaching, but also brunette and red hair colors may get a greenish undertone after improper hair care or unprofessional hair dyeing. Below we’ll discuss the reasons why your hair turns green and how you can fix the unwanted greenish undertone. Join us!
What Does Green Hair Mean?
Green hair tone usually means an oxidized mineral buildup in your hair. So, if you see a greenish tint in your locks, it may occur after swimming in chlorinated water or washing your hair with water that is high in mineral components.
Remember: Chlorine itself doesn’t make the hair turn green! Hair has mineral buildup, and some minerals (e.g., copper) turn green when they oxidize.
First things first. Chlorine, one of the chemicals in the swimming pool water that keeps it sanitary, oxidizes with other elements in the water like copper, iron, or manganese to keep the pool safe for swimming. An example of oxidization is the Statue of Liberty. It used to be brown back in the older days, but the copper in the Statue binds with the oxygen in the air, turning the color of the Statue greenish.
The other reason why your hair may turn green is that the underlying pigments showed up after color processing. Ashy hair colors have blue pigments in the hair fiber. Bleach lightens your hair to yellowish tones, and a mix of yellow and blue may result in greenish hair.
How to Fix Green Hair from Chlorine
To fix your chlorine hair, you have two options: go for natural chlorine neutralizing products, or use modern, chemical ones, like dyes, or at least shampoos for green pool hair. Professional swimmers and those who go to a pool regularly are aware of the side effects caused by swimming in the pool, so they’re used to specialized hair care for swimmers.
How to Get Rid of Green Hair Naturally
Leave-in conditioners, shampoos, and toners are great, and they definitely work, but if you wonder how to remove green from hair in a more natural way, there are a few options for you as well.
Chlorine-neutralizing products can always be found in your kitchen, no matter how often you cook. These products include baking soda, lemon, apple cider vinegar, aspirin, and even ketchup!
If you’re going for baking soda, mix it with water into a paste, massage it into the affected area, and let it sit for several minutes. Then simply rinse it out using shampoo and conditioner. You may need to repeat this procedure a few times.
To use lemon, saturate your hair, leave it for five minutes, and then wash it out. Lemon Kool-Aid may also help to remove a greenish tint.
Aspirin is a good neutralizer as well – crush about seven tablets, add water so that they dissolve, apply to your hair and let it sit for 20 minutes. Then just wash your hair with shampoo, and don’t forget to condition it!
If you trust apple cider vinegar more than other products, pour a ¼ cup of it onto your hair, work it into your hair all the way down, and wash it out with water (no shampoo).
How to Prevent Blonde Hair from Going Green after Pool
Do one or several steps from this list every time before going for a swim and forget about greenish blonde hair:
– Pre-wet your hair before swimming.
– Use a leave-in conditioner before swimming.
– Wear a swimming cap.
– Wash your hair right after swimming.
– Expose your hair to the sun after swimming.
– Try out different shampoos and conditioners for swimmers and choose the one that works for you. This can be, for example, Suave Essentials Daily Clarifying Shampoo, Dove Nutritive Solutions Clarify & Hydrate Shampoo, UltraSwim Chlorine Removal Shampoo, TRISWIM Chlorine Removal Swimmers Shampoo, Malibu C Swimmers Wellness Shampoo & Conditioner, Ion Swimmer’s Shampoo, TRIHARD Pre & Post Swim Shampoos and Conditioners, etc.
How to Get Green out of Bleached Blonde Hair
What do you do when blonde hair turned green after bleaching? To fix green hair from bleach, we recommend trying a hair dye that contains red tones, in addition to hair care products that you may find in every store. Red neutralizes greenish tones, making your hair as beautiful and healthy as you’d like it to be.
All dyes have a number that means the base color (where 1.0 is black, and 10.0 is the lightest blonde). One more number is a number after the dot, and it means the tone (usually these are 1 – ash (blue), 2 – iridescent/pearly (violet), 3 – gold (yellow), 4 – copper (orange), 5 – mahogany (red)). So, for greenish hair, you need a dye with red-mahogany tones, and this is number 5 after dot (for example, 9.5 that is a very light blonde with a reddish tone).
Now we need to choose the first number. Your hair may turn 7 dark blonde, 8 blonde, 9 light blonde, or 10 extra light blonde after bleaching. Identify this number, and you will know what hair dye to opt for that will cancel your green hair color (it will be 7.5, 8.5, 9.5, or 10.5).
Warning! Not all brands follow the universal hair color chart. Some have their own scales (for example, 12 base hair colors, and 7-8 numbers for tones). Always google the hair dye brand or ask a consultant in the store.
How to Get the Green Out of Brunette Hair?
Yes, even brunettes discover interesting side effects from swimming in a pool and bad hair coloring and start asking online how to tone green hair or how to cover up green hair. If you’re wondering what color cancels out green hair for brunettes, it’s the same as for blonde hair. To neutralize green hair, you may just use a red-based color, and you’ll get rid of the green tint in hair. The logic is the following: if you have medium brown hair, just dye it medium chestnut brown, etc.
What causes a greenish hair tint in brunette locks? This may happen if you dye too porous or damaged hair, and your base hair color is more on the cooler side or has ashy undertones. Most often a greenish undertone happens when you dye your hair from light blonde to dark. Blonde has yellow undertones, and black has blue undertones, that together make green. So, you may start noticing a green shade after a few hair washes.
How to cope with greenish brunette hair? Either re-dye it in some time with the right warm hair dye or include reddish hair products into your hair routine.
The brown hair shade has near equal parts of the three primary colors (red, yellow, blue). Blonde hair shades have no red pigment at all. If you apply a cool hair color with a green/blue base, this usually results in green, blue, or blue-green hair.
Other Most Common Questions About Green Hair with Expert Answers
Let’s check out other possible ways of getting green out of hair by answering more questions from our inbox.
Will Purple Shampoo Fix Green Hair? No, it won’t. No matter what your natural color is, purple shampoo will not fix green hair. Instead, red-based colors may help to get rid of greenish tones. Purple shampoo helps to fix yellowish undertones, blue shampoos cancel orangey tints.
Does Ketchup/Tomato Sauce/Tomato Juice Fix Green Hair? Yes! A lot of women have already tried this hair hack and shown that it may help to remove the green color. Of course, it depends on the reason why it turned green. This quick and easy hack works for blonde hair turned green after the pool. Massage the substance into the green areas, wrap your hair with foil for 30 minutes, and wash it afterwards using your shampoo or conditioner.
Can I Bleach Out the Green in Hair? Never bleach your hair twice. You need to cancel the greenish shade first. If you bleached your hair and saw a green tint, the worst decision would be to bleach it once more.
As you see, having your hair go green is not that big of a deal whether you have blonde or brown hair. There are numerous hacks and products that can cancel the unwanted effect in your hair, so there’s no need to worry. However, it is always best to go to the salon and tell the hair colorist all your hair color story if you are unsure about how to get green out of hair. At-home hair dyeing is not as easy as it may seem, and you have to keep in mind too many details.
Featured Image: Annie Gray – unsplash.com
