Henna for Brightening Hair

Lawsonia inermis

Henna is an herb that has been used for hair and skin coloring by women in Egypt and India for thousands of years. On the skin, it is used to make intricate orange-red patterns on the hands and feet. In the hair, it is used as a deep conditioner or to add color or highlights. If you add color with henna, the color will be permanent – it will not wash out. It may fade a little over several months, however.

Using Henna to Brighten Hair

Method

• Follow the instructions on the package of henna to mix. Usually you will be mixing hot water with the henna herb, and adding a little bit of oil for conditioning. You could also add a food coloring, such as coffee to enhance the browns in brown hair, or carrot juice or pomegranate to enhance reds.
• When you are ready to apply the henna, use a comb to separate strands of hair. You may want to use a thick paintbrush to paint the henna onto each strand.
• Leave the henna on for 30-45 minutes. Then rinse thoroughly. Do not shampoo yet—wait another 24 hours first.

Why It Works

When you coat the shaft of a hair with henna paste, the paste gradually migrates into the hair shaft and binds with keratin proteins there.

Precautions

Do not mix henna with over-the-counter hair coloring kits. The two kinds of color may react together to give you a very unpleasant result.

You cannot curl or chemically treat hair that has been colored with henna. Curling won’t work; while chemical treatments may produce results that are quite different than what you intended.

Henna does not wash out, but some sources say that it can be removed with warm mineral oil. Apply warm mineral oil to your hair, leave it on for 20-25 minutes, rinse, and shampoo.

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