How to dilute or lighten your colour paste

Posted by Charmaine on 30th Jul 2020

Here we look at how to dilute or slightly adjust the colour tone of your

Desert Shadow hair colour

How do I dilute or lighten my Desert Shadow organic hair colour?

You can add Alma or Shine to any of our Desert Shadow hair colours except for the Indigo. It is more common for people to want to lighten the Walnut or the Chocolate Shadow but it is also ok to do it with the other colours too.

The more Amla or Shine mask you add to your hair colour the lighter the shade will be. We recommend starting with a smaller amount and then adjusting with future colour treatments. Below we have suggestions and what to expect.

AMLA RAW HAIR MASK : will also slightly cool down any red tones and give a treatment at the same time

SHINE RAW HAIR MASK: will simply dilute the colour and give a treatment at the same time.

For both BROWN & RED SHADES: Mix the Amla or Shine raw hair mask in a separate bowl and add it to your colour at the very end of your mixing just before application.

Adding Amla raw hair mask

Add 20g of Amla to 1 box

20g of Amla will not change the depth of your Desert Shadow hair colour by much. It will simply add a conditioning effect and may assist by cooling red tones if your hair tends to pick up on and throw red when colouring. *Note: this will not reduce red tones in red colours but will slightly reduce the vibrancy of the copper

Add 30g of Amla to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

30g of Amla you will start to see a difference in the shade, it wont be extreme but it will be ever so slightly lighter.

Add 40g - 50g of Amla to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

This is where you start to see a noticeable difference in the colour tone. Your shade will now be lighter.

Add 80g of Amla to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

You will now be diluting your Desert Shadow hair colour by almost half. The colour will now be totally different and you will be looking at a shade that is lighter. We suggest you do a patch test or strand test before applying the colour to make sure it is what you are after you can see our strand test instructions here: https://www.desertshadow.com.au/complete-organic-hair-beauty-blog/strand-testing-tips-for-first-time-users-testing-our-organic-colours/

Adding Shine raw hair mask

Add 20g of Shine to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

20g of Shine will not change the depth of your of Desert Shadow hair colour by much. It will simply add a conditioning effect.

Add 30g of Shine to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

30g of Shine you will start to see a difference in the shade, it wont be extreme but it will be ever so slightly lighter.

Add 40g - 50g of Shine to 1 box of Desert Shadow hair colour

This is where you start to see a noticeable difference in the colour tone. Your shade will now be lighter.

Add 80g of Shine to 1 box

We do not recommend adding more than 50g of Amla or Shine to Chocolate Shadow or Deep Chestnut Shadow. This is because the balance of the brown will change and if your base colour is lighter ( say Blonde or Grey ) the result may have a slight blue or green hue to it in the sunlight. This does not happen to all people and is not a problem for those who have a medium brown or red base colour.

The blue or green hue is fixable by adding a red tone to counter balance but better to avoid so we don't need to do any corrections :)

*Diluting of Indigo is not recommended at all.

We suggest you take notes so you can remember your recipes for future!