Toner

What is a toner

Toner cancels out and corrects unwanted tones in your hair brassy yellow, gold, orange, red or ash tones. It can also be used to give the pre-lightened hair the desired shade eg. Caramel shade.

We use semi permanent toners for all hair types. Although they help with brassiness for blonde hair they do fade because they aren't a permanent colour. You may have to re tone your hair 4-6 weeks later.

Toners will not lighten you hair they either deposit colour onto your hair (to make the colour darker) or change the toner of it eg. From yellow to white shade. When going lighter it’s almost 100% that you will have to apply a toner every time. The only reason that you wouldn't have to apply a toner is after pre lightening the hair and it goes to the correct tone, also if you have blonde hair and your hair lightens easily and doesn't throw off a yellow/brassy tone. Toners take from 5-20 to process. In our salons we use a heat lamp which halves the time.

A toner is the most important part of a hair service, because you are creating the colour that your client wants, after you have pre lightened the hair.

One of the toners we use in our salons is called an igora semi permanent mouse. These toners work very fast from 20 seconds-3 minutes. The more towel dried your hair is the faster it will work. This is especially ideal for clients that don’t like sitting in the basin chair for long periods of time and also for blondes, if using it to deposit colour onto pre lightened hair this type of toner will not last as long.  If using these toners at home for a colour up keep we recommend not towel drying your hair, so you have more time to apply all over the hair and reduce the risk of over toning. When you've over toned your hair it will come up either purple, really ash or even pink. If this does happen a way to get rid of the unwanted tones is to use a deep cleansing shampoo a few times, as toner does fade slightly every time you wash your hair. It is not recommended to tone your hair more then once a week.

Purple Shampoo
If you have blonde hair and you don’t have a toner at home there is something else that you could use which is a purple shampoo. The shampoo work as a toner every time you wash your hair, it brightens your blonde by restoring your hair to its former cooler colour. The reason why the shampoo is purple is because it is the opposite of yellow on the colour wheel which is why it cools the gold/brassy tones down. It is recommended to use the purple shampoo only once a week, because you can over tone with the shampoo as well. The darker the colour of the purple is in the shampoo the stronger it is. Purple shampoo can be also used on grey hair.

Written By  Becc