How the Hair Habits From Our Youth Evolve and Change With Us
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Welcome to Blasts From My Beauty Past, our monthly column written by journalist, and Live That Glow Beauty Editor, Philippa Pearne. For the last 17 years, Philippa has written about her own beauty wins, fails and everything in between. Today, she’s discussing the beauty habits of her 20s, including addictions to fake tan and the iconic Sun In hair lightening spray.
It’s the summer of 2003. Justin Timberlake and Britney have broken up, denim jackets are back in fashion, and I have just started my job at Blockbuster (meaning free DVD rentals and unlimited access to bags of popcorn on shift. I was kind of a big deal.)
I am 20 years old, and not only do I have a cool job, but I am also well and truly into my fake tan era. The more tanned my face the better, quite frankly. That, teamed with my bleached blonde hair and I’m a walking, talking Barbie doll! Goals.
But in order to prevent Barbie’s mask from slipping and maintain my hair colour (block blonde you understand, no highlights or any resemblance of depth), I’d need to make regular trips to the salon. And, whilst working at Blockbuster gave me street cred, it didn’t exactly pay the big bucks.
Enter stage left, Sun In. That ‘genius’ bottle of hydrogen peroxide that smelled, in my opinion, like bleach and fish. Yum. Its aim? To break down the melanin pigments in the hair and lighten it up with the help of the sun.
A few spritzes of Sun-In (or in my case, half the bottle), combined with an afternoon in the garden and hey presto! Same-day bleached blonde hair that didn’t require me to sit in a salon chair for three hours making polite conversation, or parting ways with a three-figured wad of cash.
Sun In was meant to replicate what lemons can *apparently* do for blonde hair. “Squeeze some lemon into your hair, enjoy some time outside and your hair colour will be naturally lightened”, I was told. Rrrright. I tried this a few times in my quest for Barbie status, but my hair colour didn’t flinch. So I turned to Sun-In.
It was like an addiction. My hair is naturally fair (I was a weird-looking kid with bright white, curly locks) but the kind of blonde I was now looking for was almost radioactive.
With Sun In, I felt I had a way of cheating the system. I didn’t need to pay over £100 for a salon appointment because this bottle, which cost under £10, would do just as good a job. And I could use it whenever I liked.
And there’s the problem: If there was even a slight hint of my blonde fading, QUICK! Spray in some Sun In and get outside! Or, on rainy days, blast the hair dryer onto it – after all, it’s heat that activates the lightening process, not UV rays. (This presents me with a whole new list of questions. The first being, why did they think it was sensible to encourage people to go and sit in the sun when surely everyone, even back in the 80s, knew the risks? I guess ‘Heat In’ doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.)
So, addicted, I would forever be spraying Sun In into my hair, looking blonder by the hour and constantly smelling of bleachy-fish, which the makers of Sun In tried to cover up with the name, ‘Lemon Fresh’. But I know what I smelt.
This went on for an entire summer until one day, my mum grabbed the ends of my hair and gasped. “Your hair looks dead!” she exclaimed. Bit harsh, I thought. But as it turns out, whilst Sun In was a really good hair lightener, the duty of care left a lot to be desired.
My hair had been so overloaded with, well, bleach whenever I felt like it, that it was breaking off at the ends and looked desert-dry. You know, bale of hay sort of dry. And so yellow. Not the best look, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Mum booked me a hair appointment to get it fixed, treated and doused in whatever form of hydration they could find. She promised to pay for it just this once and then made me promise I would never touch Sun In again.
Even at age 20, a metaphorical slap on the wrist from your mum is quite simply, the scariest thing ever. I haven’t so much as winked at a bottle since.
This all got me thinking about our hair colour habits now, as fully-fledged adults who finally understand why bleach and UV rays are the enemy. And how our grown-up habits compare to the ones from our teens and twenties.
Do I still want my hair to be blonde? Absolutely. I tried the brunette thing and let’s just say, my graduation photo will haunt me forever. Do I want to achieve that blonde through the means of draining its moisture with a hydrogen peroxide spray and frying it in the midday sun? Erm, no.
The elephant in the room is that, of course, I now no longer have to rely on a DVD rental store to pay my wages (which is a good job really because… Netflix). I’ve done alright in my career to be able to book frequent trims, treatments and colours. So, my hair is regularly maintained whilst getting ample TLC.
The clanger here though is that most people I know go to the salon every three months or so, when they can fit it into their schedules or can afford it. I go every six weeks.
And there she is, that 20-year-old girl, hooked on her hair hue. I may now be able to tolerate an imperfect hair colour for a little longer than I did back then (you can’t fully escape greys at 41), but you heard me – six weeks! Clearly, I am still not as tolerant as others.
Thankfully though, as addicted as I am – and always have been – to having a fresh head of colour, I am now at least sensible enough to do it right. I have an Olaplex treatment at every appointment which keeps my hair hydrated, I don’t always have a full head of colour, and I use colour-protecting products in between appointments that also help to keep my hair shiny and healthy.
There’s no scorching my scalp in the sun, no spraying chemicals into my hair on the daily and certainly no scoldings from my mother (well, not about this anyway).
As we mature, we may still be holding onto certain habits, but nine times out of ten, they’re diluted by age. Growing up enables us to become considerably more patient as you realise fast solutions (like Sun In) aren’t necessarily the best ones. And you become more willing to take the long way round whilst staying loyal to your expectations.
So, stay sensible kids. Only, with a dash of your 20-year-old self.
Get Glowing!
