How to take care of colour treated hair

How does hair colouring cause hair damage?

Whenever you get your hair bleached, the stylist will typically use an alkaline agent to open the hair’s cuticles. Once open, an oxidative agent will be used to get rid of your hair’s natural pigment (the melanin). While this technique can turn your locks from mousy brown to platinum blonde hair, this process is highly damaging to the integrity of your hair strands.

Put simply, you’re raising the cuticles and damaging the bonds inside your hair (and this process is necessary in order to achieve a lighter colour.) With the hair bonds damaged, you might find that your hair becomes increasingly brittle, dry, frizzy and unmanageable. 

Signs of hair colouring damage

• Dullness
• Brittle hair
• Dry hair
• Unmanageable, tuggy hair
• Excessive split ends
• Hair lacks shine

How to take care of colour-treated hair

To keep your colour-treated hair nourished and healthy, it’s important to curate a haircare routine that combines hydration, gentle cleansing, and progressive hair repair. Even if your hair doesn’t necessarily feel damaged yet, it most likely will become damaged if you continue colouring your hair (or if you coloured your hair a lot in the past.)

Here are just a number of steps you can take to ensure that you keep your colour-treated hair healthy:

Minimize use of hot styling tools

Curlers, rollers, straighteners, and even hair dryers - it’s a good idea to take a break from your hot styling tools when you have colour-treated hair. This is because heat damages the hair and makes it brittle with continued use; especially if you already have colour-treated or colour-damaged hair.

Like bleaching and colouring, heat styling can break the hair and reduce shine, so you’ll want to minimize your use of hot styling tools as much as possible in order to avoid the appearance of dull, damaged hair. The easiest way to do so is to let your hair dry naturally and use a leave-in treatment after a shower or a bath - not only will this prevent heat damage, but it will prevent frizz. 

Our Hair Organics Moroccan Argan Oil Leave-in Treatment uses a mix of Argan oil and Coconut oil to naturally hydrate, nourish, and smooth the hair. Argan oil offers long-lasting scalp hydration and conditions the hair as it dries, while the coconut oil helps smooth flyaways and control frizz. You can apply this leave-in treatment after gently towel-drying the hair; apply all over the hair, tie up and let your hair dry naturally. 

Benefits of Argan Oil

Argan oil has been long-used in hair care products to provide shine, hydration, conditioning and nourishment. Here are just a few benefits of using argan oil on the hair:

• Rich in antioxidants
• Rich in fatty acids
• Natural hydrant
• Rich in Vitamin E
• Helps restore shine and bounce
• Lightweight 

Always use a thermic protection spray

If you’re going to be using hot styling tools, it’s necessary to always use heat protection spray or a heat protection cream. Some hot styling tools now come with in-built “hair-safe” temperatures, but to be safe, you should always use a heat protection spray - even when you’re simply using a hair dryer.  

Keep your hair hydrated 

When you have colour-treated hair, you might notice that your hair often feels drier, more brittle, or has a rougher texture than usual. This is because bleaching dries out your hair, so it’s important to keep it adequately hydrated with nourishing creams, leave-in treatments and oils.

Alongside our leave-in treatment, we also have our Moroccan Argan Oil Hair Food, a nourishing hair treatment that is designed to help prevent and treat dryness, frizz, hair breakage and hair brittleness. Formulated with Argan oil, coconut oil and conditioning shea butter, this hydrating blend can help ward off any hair damage and leave your locks feeling silky, shiny, and soft-to-the-touch.  

Don’t overwash your hair

When you have colour-treated, chemical-treated or colour-damaged hair, it’s important to not overwash your hair. Overwashing the hair can lead to prolonged dryness, as you’re repeatedly stripping the hair of its natural oils. For chemically-treated hair, we’d recommend washing your hair 1-2 times a week with a gentle shampoo.  

Wash your hair in tepid water, not hot water

One habit that can largely improve the quality of damaged or colour-treated hair: washing your hair in tepid, room-temperature water, rather than washing your hair in scalding hot water. The reason? Scorching hot water dries out your hair and inflates your hair cuticles, which causes frizz, dryness, and makes your hair more difficult to manage.

While it might seem impossible to consider taking a tepid shower in the middle of winter, you can always simply go for the old-school method and wash your hair using a jug of water and the bathroom sink. Your hair will thank you for it!

Creating a hair care routine for colour-treated hair

Now you know how to look after colour-treated hair, what should your typical hair care routine look like? Here’s what we recommend:

Gentle washing 1-2 times a week

Washing colour-treated hair more than twice a week can dry out the hair fibers and leave you with dull, rough-textured and hard-to-manage hair. We’d recommend using a gentle shampoo, such as our Herbal Conditioner - the formula is enriched with soothing Aloe and Ratchette, and won’t dry out chemically-treated hair.

Never skimp on conditioner

For those with oily hair or thinning hair, you might sometimes skimp on conditioner to avoid that heavy feeling on your hair. However, when you colour-treat your hair, conditioner is no longer simply an option, it’s a requirement. Our Moroccan Argan Oil conditioner is designed for those with chemically-treated hair; to add moisture, create shine, and create hair that feels soft, smooth and silky to-the-touch. 

Use a leave-in treatment at least once a week

For some intense hydration, make sure to use a leave-in treatment at least once a week. This will give your hair some much-needed moisture and prevent tangling and brittleness.

Add shine

For those with colour-treated hair or damaged hair, a lack of shine and an overall “dullness” is typical - this is due to the dryness and the lack of natural colour pigment in your hair. You can overcome this by using hair oil; hair oils are lightweight and easy to use, and can be applied to wet or dry hair to give it a boost. Our Moroccan Argan Revitalizing Oil is formulated with natural argan oil and coconut oil to add sheen and bounce to the hair, while nourishing the hair bonds with the oil’s conditioning properties.

Bottom Line

Having coloured hair doesn’t mean you have to put up with dry and brittle locks - so long as you keep your hair healthy, nourished, and moisturized, you shouldn’t experience prolonged problems with damage.