How to Choose the Right Hair Highlights

Choosing the right highlights for your hair can really give you a great look. Bad highlights can make you look pale, washed out or even ridiculous. Highlights should match your skin and be within one to three shades of your natural hair color to achieve the best, most natural look. Follow these steps to choose the right highlights for your hair.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• A Good Hair Stylist

Choosing the Right Highlights for Your Hair

1. First, find out what your skin type is. Is your skin a warm tone or a cool tone? Almost all highlights fall into two categories, warm or cool. Knowing your skin tone will help you decide which category your highlights will fall in.

2. Next, know your hair color and what would look best on you. Picking the right color or colors is key to the most natural looking highlights. Natural looking highlights will enhance your skin and make you look your absolute best.

3. Next, choose shades that are a little darker or lighter than your natural hair color and that would complement your skin tone. If your skin tone is dark, rich browns and deep reds may look best on you. If you have a golden tone to your skin, avoid bright colors such as oranges, yellows or golds as these will wash you out. Stick with auburns. If your skin is fair, you will find that the honey tones, caramels and neutral colors will look fabulous on you.

4. Finally, find a stylist and have them offer advice. A great stylist can help you pick the perfect color and to give you a look that you will love.

Tips & Warnings

• Take your time and do some research. Look through magazines and consider what colors would look best on you.
• As you get older and your hair grays, you may want to consider lightening your shades to blend in more with the grays.
• Know what kind of highlights you want. What is trendy today are the bold, chunky highlights while some people still prefer when the color is weaved throughout the head of hair for a more natural look.
• Know where you want your highlights. Do you want them throughout or just close to your face?
• You can always ask your stylist to do a strand test to essentially 'try before you buy.' This is where they will highlight just a few strands of hair.
• This article was not written for those who desire bold or dramatic highlights rather natural looking highlights. If you want to go bold or with something dramatic or crazy, then you probably already have a color in mind.
• Bringing some pictures of the highlights that you want can make the experience much better and exacting.
• Choosing the right hair color is definitely not as easy as just picking a color that you like. Do your research and know what looks good on you.
• The further away that you are from your natural hair color, the more maintenance that will be required to upkeep the color. Decide before the highlights if you have the time to devote to your new look.
• Although home hair coloring is the least expensive option, this method is much harder to achieve the desired look when it comes to highlights.