My hair is naturally sandy at level 7-8, and I am now getting white hairs. I do my hair at home only as hairdressers are too expensive for me.

After some experimenting, I found a colour that seems to blend in with my roots in Loreal 8 Excellence Ash Blonde. Except it doesn't cover all the white hairs! I do use a special shampoo to manage my sensitive skin that fade dyes quickly too, which really doesn't help.

I am also getting fed up with it all being one block colour, and the current colour isn't as nice as my natural colour either.

So, I am trying to decide what to do.

I used to use Sun-In when I was younger, and it gave it natural looking blonde highlights that looked great. It didn't damage my hair either, and I think this would blend in with my white hairs (I wish I did this in the first place now). Except now that I have used box dye in my hair, I'm not sure about how to attempt transitioning to it without risking wrecking my hair.

Another option is to highlight my hair, but not only do I need to do this at home by myself, I would then need to find a way to touch up the roots.

I could go for an ombre too, but I would prefer highlights really.

Another option is to use B4 to strip the current colour off, and then try Loreal Preference 03 Lightest Ash Blonde. This will give me a block colour, but as a high lift dye, at least the peroxide should lift my hair to a lighter colour that should blend in the white hair more?

What do you good folks recommend?

I wouldn't go near sun-in - it turned my honey coloured hair yellow, a hairdresser friend of mine said she'd never touch the stuff!

I've been dying my hair for the past 10 years (it's currently pink and purple!), Colour B4 is pretty decent stuff though.

I think the worst thing with sun-in is that you have no control over the outcome. It may go a nice colour, but it may not. And you don't know until you have done it!

Maybe B4 and then using the lightest ash blonde is worth a try?

I might have the idea of dying over with purple dye if the lightest ash goes too orange or yellow....

Thank you very much for the advice

From researching online, I have found the high-lift colour I wanted to use has been discontinued by Loreal.

Maybe this is a blessing in disguise though as I now have the impression that it is better to use bleach. This is because the bleach + ash dye is more likely to result in a more ash coloured result than just using a high-lift a couple of times. However, I personally don't want to use bleach as people's hair always look damaged after they use it.

I have also now read that ash colours don't cover white, and that I need to use a neutral to cover my white hairs instead. But box dyes always pull the red/orange/yellow shades due to the strength of the peroxide, so less ash will result in a more brassy coloured hair than what I already have. But maybe I could mix ash + neutral together (around 8-9 levels) and see how that goes?

Anyway, my search for a simple solution to cover/blend in white hairs, and also give a nice tone to the rest of my level 7-8 hair continues...

Also, you don't want a purple dye as such to get rid of the brassy tones, you want a purple shampoo that's used for toning Purple dye will be too rich pigment wise and leave you with purple hair!

http://www.superdrug.com/b/Pro:Voke?...Q&gclsrc=aw.ds

That range is supposed to be very good, I've heard good things about it! As my natural colour is brown, and I bleach mine and then put neon dyes over it, it's not a product I've used myself though.

The first colour dye I put on was a level 9 golden blonde. At first, it looked great. But after time, it would start to turn a really horrid golden yellow-brassy colour that even purple shampoo couldn't cancel!

Actually, it wasn't that bad really, but it did look fake. But, I've already decided that if I have this yellow-brassy colour issue in future, I'll try a semi purple dye with conditioner instead!

If you don't mind me asking; what is your natural hair colour, and what condition is your hair in if you bleach your hair? Do you find bleaching easy to do at home? I suppose you avoid toning issues as you use neon dyes? Apologies if I am asking too many questions