The best way to cover gray hair is quick, easy, inexpensive and natural-looking. From Just for Men to gray reducing shampoos, which is it?

Why Cover Gray Hair?

Being gray doesn’t necessarily mean you’re getting old. Many people notice their first silver strands while still in their late teens or early 20s.

At first, we’ll comb our hair differently. Maybe a right part instead of left. Push the hair at the temples forward instead of back. But as the gray progresses, we have to make a decision: let it take over, or cover it up?

It’s now or never, because once we are gray, there’s no going back. As men, we don’t want everybody to see we’ve dyed our hair.

But banishing grays has never been easier or more discreet than it is today. You can do it in the privacy of your bathroom once a month in about 15 minutes.

In fact, it’s better to do it at home if you want natural-looking results, since hairdressers often use excessively rich colors that never look real.

And there are more ways of doing it than grabbing a box of dye.

Demi-Permanent Dyes

First gray hairs can be blended out with a demi-permanent coloring product like Just for Men.

It’s very easy to use: mix according to the enclosed instructions, apply to the hair, leave for five minutes, and rinse.

Unless your hair is sprinkled throughout with gray, there’s no need to dye the whole head, nor to use the entire package.

Mix an appropriate portion of the two supplied components to a ratio of 1-to-1 and apply only to areas where you are graying.

If you dye the whole head, it’s important that the back and sides are slightly darker than the top if you want it to look natural. This is achieved by first applying to the back, then the sides, and lastly the top. The reason is, the longer the dye is left to develop, the darker the hair becomes.

Choosing the Right Color

Demi-permanent products like Just for Men cannot lighten hair, but they can darken it. If you’re unsure between two shades, choose the lightest. Your aim should be to blend out grays without altering the color of the rest of the hair; a shade too dark would darken the whole head.

Another reason for choosing a shade not quite as dark as your original color is because as we gray, our skin pales. This is why highly saturated colors look harsh and unnatural on people who would normally be gray.

For Dark Haired Men

The best color to choose if you’re dark is medium ash brown, which allows you to retain your dark looks without appearing artificial; ash tones lack red pigment, making them less intense and more natural-looking.

If your original hair color was black, dark or darkest brown usually gives best results.

For Blond Men

If you are blond, use a color as close to your own as possible. Should your hair develop a yellow tinge, choose an ash shade to counteract it.

For Redheaded Men

Red coloring products rarely look natural. Depending on the depth of your original color, warm blond and brown tones work best.

Be careful with reddish browns, since these nearly always leave an overly saturated, “obviously dyed” effect. This will also be the case if you choose a shade too dark.

What If Your Hair Turns Out Too Dark?

In case you choose a shade too dark, you can try fading it with a clarifying shampoo, but it will only work if applied immediately after the treatment.

If you don’t have a clarifying shampoo, mix baking soda and a dandruff shampoo like Head & Shoulders to a ratio of 1-to-1 for a similar effect.

This won’t work, however, if you’ve used a permanent dye.

Source: Pixabay

Permanent Dyes

Just for Men and similar products are only effective if you have 25 to 40 percent gray or less. You’ll notice you need a different kind of product when your hair color starts to fade and turn “muddy” merely days after application.

Permanent Hair Dye for Men

Although marketed exclusively for women, permanent dyes available at drugstores are also suitable for men, and work well even on completely gray or white hair. However, their often exotic and fashion inspired colors may be considered feminine.

Therefore, select a shade that resembles a natural hair color, with a simple name like “light brown,” “medium brown,” “dark blonde,” “medium blonde” etc.

Which Products Work Best?

You need a product formulated for 100 percent gray coverage.

Offering a color range suitable for anyone who wants natural-looking results, Poly Color by Schwarzkopf is probably the most reliable European drugstore brand. But if you’re looking for an ash tone, you may need to visit a beauty supplier, which you can do online.

In the United States, look for L’oreal’s Excellence Creme Hair Color or Excellence Age Perfect. If uncertain, seek the advice of a beauty supplier; most have a contact form on their website for this purpose.

Don’t be misled: you’ll find dyes marketed for men that are labeled “permanent,” but if you read the product description carefully, you’re likely to discover that they’re actually demi-permanent. A number may be designated on the product box indicating the level of permanence—see the below table.

When choosing a light or blonde shade, avoid “high-lift” products. These lighten hair and may cause it to turn red.

How to Use Permanent Dye

Permanent dyes are applied in the same way as demi-permanent dyes, as described above, but take longer to develop. The usual duration is 20 to 30 minutes.

Maintaining Permanently Dyed Hair

This is where it gets tricky and is the reason many men give up on permanent dye.

Following a first full head application, you’ll need to touch up the roots once every four to six weeks. To revive your overall color, comb the dye through to the ends five or ten minutes before rinsing.

Between treatments, you may need to cover regrowth with root concealer, which will last until your next shampoo. These are available in several adaptable shades formulated to blend with most hair colors. They come as powders applied with a brush, liquids applied with a wand, and as sticks and sprays.

If your hair is thinning, maybe you’re using a scalp concealer, which will do the same job.

To keep color looking fresh until your next treatment, apply a hair mask once a week and a leave-in conditioner daily. Use haircare products designed for colored hair; apart from hydrating, these provide UV protection which prevents fading.

If your color does fade, try a color-boosting shampoo and conditioner. The section below, “How to Pre-Treat Hair Before Coloring” may also be useful.

Product Permanence Levels

Denotation	Permanence Level	Duration	Gray Coverage	Components contained in the package
Semi-Permanent or Temporary	1	3 to 12 washes	First grays or less than 25 percent	1
Demi- or Semi-Permanent	2	Up to 30 washes	Between 25 and 40 percent	2
Permanent	3	The color must grow out	100 percent	2

How to Pre-Treat Hair Before Coloring

If you find that permanent coloring products tend to fade quickly or barely take at all, your hair is probably very coarse, as gray hair often is. You can solve this by pre-treating or softening with 10 or 20 volume developer lotion, which you can buy online or at a beauty supplier: it is actually the same stuff as the white, creamy component contained in the box, but you’ll need this to mix with the dye.

Just brush the substance over your hair, leave for 10 minutes, then rinse and towel dry before applying color. You don’t need to pre-treat the whole head if only certain areas are a problem: e.g., the temples.

Removing Hair Dye From Your Skin

To prevent staining your skin, wear protective gloves and apply petroleum jelly to the hairline. Otherwise, stains are easily removed with aftershave, cologne, or rubbing alcohol.

To minimize staining of the scalp, don’t wash your hair directly before dyeing.

Source: Pixabay

Progressive Dyes for Gradual Gray Coverage

If you’ve let yourself go completely gray, you may not want to return to a darker color overnight.

For a discreet, gradual change, and very natural-looking results, use a progressive dye like Grecian Formula or Touch of Gray.

Applied in the same way as a hair tonic, progressive dyes allow you to control how quickly you return to a darker color and how much gray you cover. Another advantage is that they contain no peroxide or ammonia, which means there’s no risk of damage to the hair and scalp.

Progressive dyes are generally available in light brown, medium brown, dark brown, black, and jet black.

From what I gather, Grecian Formula isn’t as effective since the removal of lead acetate from its ingredients.

Gray Reducing Shampoo

Another type of progressive colorant is gray reducing shampoo. Like Grecian, this also reacts with oxygen, giving gradual, natural-looking results for all shades from light to dark. And, as with Grecian, you can control how much gray is covered.

The most popular product is Control GX by Just for Men.

A similar one is Alpecin’s Grey Attack.

Other Gray Reducing Shampoos

The product I favor is Men’s Master Repigmenting Shampoo for Men, available on Amazon, but only in Europe as far as I can ascertain.

It’s a conditioning shampoo that stains white hair to gray, giving an overall darker effect without the natural color appearing in any way manipulated. It should be applied once or twice a week, and is also suitable for facial hair. I apply it to my mustache.

Highlights and Lowlights

Depending on the lengths you’re prepared to go to, you could get highlight and lowlights, which would mean visiting a hair colorist for good results.

This kind of treatment is low maintenance and needs redoing only once every couple of months, depending on hair length.

For Black Hair

If your hair is naturally black, try black lowlights.

This wouldn’t cover the gray completely, but it would tone it down while appearing completely natural.

For Blond Hair

For blond hair, try highlights and lowlights of pearl, beige and medium blonde or similar, depending on the type of blond you are. Important is that the ash tones neutralize any yellow, for which you may have to swap you regular shampoo and conditioner for so-called silver or purple products.

Letting Nature Take Its Course

Embracing your gray and letting nature take its course isn’t the easy way out.

Maintaining a well-groomed white or silver hue takes as much time and effort as color treating.

The yellow tinge you often see in gray and white hair is caused by UV exposure. The only way to get rid of it is with a monthly silver rinse plus regular shampooing and conditioning with so-called silver or purple products designed specifically to neutralize yellow.

What Is the Best Way to Cover Gray Hair?

So, what is the best way to cover gray hair? This is my conclusion on a scale of 1 to 5:

5. Highlights and Lowlights

As a man, I would not like to sit in a hairdressing salon with foils on my head. Highlights and lowlights would therefore be out of the question. The process is also costly and time consuming, although I like the fact that little maintenance is required and the results are natural-looking.

4. Permanent Dye

Permanent dyes lead to far too much maintenance. I think few men would be prepared to spend that amount of time and effort on their hair.

3. Progressive Dye

I looked into Grecian Formula many years ago. I’m afraid I was unable to continue with it due to its smell, which I found somewhat cloying. But that could just be me.

As for its performance since the removal of lead acetate, the only way to find out is to try.

If progressive dyes of this type do work well, and if not all have the same smell as Grecian Formula (I haven’t tried any others), I’d give them the number one spot.

2. Demi-Permanent Dye

Demi-permanent dyes like Just for Men are great if you still have much of your original color. I used it myself in my younger years, and it does fulfill my criteria of quick, easy, inexpensive and natural-looking.

1. Gray Reducing Shampoo

But the best for me are gray reducing shampoos, which also condition the hair.

The Men’s Master product is my favorite, because in spite of giving a darker overall impression, the hair still appears to be graying, making it inconceivable that a colorant may have been used.

It’s actually easier than letting nature take its course.

© 2024, J. Richardson. All rights reserved.