Beauty steal: Clarifying shampoo for summer

by Emily

A couple of months ago (I cannot begin to tell you how relieved I am to be able to say "a couple of MONTHS ago"), I had the World's Worst Dye Job, remember? Oh, wait, correction: I had TWO OF THEM. Well, things are way better these days - my hair is just a shade darker than the roots now growing in, and I've sworn off hair dyes pretty much for the rest of my life, such was the traumatic nature of that experience.

I did a lot of Internet research during that dark (HA HA HA, GET IT?) time in my life, and one of the more surprising tidbits of advice I ran across was that hairdressers sometimes recommend a strong clarifying shampoo to help quickly fade a too-dark dye job. Specifically, they seem to recommend Paul Mitchell Shampoo Three, a clarifying shampoo that actually says, right there on the label, "Not safe for color-treated hair." WELL OF COURSE I GOT MYSELF SOME.

I'm not sure it really helped to fade my color any (though I've seen a lot of user reviews that back up that theory), but what I DID discover was a really great deep clarifying shampoo that does an amazing job removing buildup and makes my hair super soft and manageable after I've used it. I only use it once or twice a week now, but whenever I do, my hair seems to really take to the conditioner I use afterwards, and I NEVER (seriously, NEVER) have a bad hair day after using it. I imagine it's particularly suited to summer use, when hair gets regularly exposed to chlorinated water, salty air, sunscreens, and product after product that claims to tame frizz and prevent damage from humidity.

I've gone through a whole bottle in the last month and I'm about to buy a second. For around $9 at nationwide salons like Hair Cuttery, this is a true beauty steal. Get yourself some!

{Photo credit: amazon.com}

Comments

[Steph]

I'm not sure if I commented then, but I literally accidentally dyed my hair black TWICE the same exact times that you did, so weird! I went to a salon to have mine fixed (I may have even called out of work to do this, ahem) and she used a clarifying shampoo to lighten my hair, then used toner to even the color out, and left me with a pretty reddish shade. Not the end result I was going for when I grabbed a bottle of LIGHT BROWN dye (which is what I used when I accidentally dyed my hair black) but it was better than having black hair, which looks AWFUL on me! The hairdresser who fixed my hair said that some people's hair is really porous and to lessen the times on the bottle or go for a really lighter shade. Since I'm apparently good at tempting fate, I dyed my hair again myself and used a bottle of dark blonde to get a medium brown result!
Basically this is my extremely long winded way of saying that thank you for posting this, I'm definitely going to keep a bottle of this for any emergencies, and for the the reasons you posted!