Metallic shades are all the rage right now, but one salon offering a twist on the trend is The Chapel. The salon’s senior colourist, Symon May, has unveiled his latest colour trend, Annealing Metallics (the process of heating metals and the colours they produce), after becoming interested in how metal is becoming a part of people’s daily lives.
“I saw that people had accepted metal as part of their everyday hair-wardrobe,” says Symon. “I became interested in this process and the colours that metal releases under the stress of heat and flame. As in life, often our brightest colours show when faced with stress.”
Symon created four bespoke looks to represent four different metals: gold, copper, steel and silver.
Here, Symon reveals how he created the steel look…
Step by step:
1) Lots of research! A lot of time was spent studying the colours that metals release under stress, drawing up ideas and discussing them with the team.
2) Once the colours for the steel look were decided, Symon applied a pre-lightener using the balayage technique to the model’s hair, lifting the hair to a very light blonde in a gradual blend.
3) A dark grey shade at a level 6 was then applied to the root area.
4) The hair was then sectioned from the bottom and held taut at a low elevation, while rectangles were painted freehand onto the hair to create a graduated look, similar to heated steel, but using blocks to add a more industrial feel.
5) Symon then graduated the colour blocks from yellow to orange to purple to blue to mimic the effect of annealed steel.
6) Hair was kept simple with a straight finish and sharp ends, replicating a solid sheet of steel.
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Symon May’s unique technique is here
