Confession…I love my hair but really have longed for a non-toxic non-chemically treated hair dye solution to my gray hair. My hair has been gray for as long as I can remember. I stopped dyeing it probably 5 years ago. I just let it be gray. I really didn’t like the texture hair dyes gave my hair. Not to mention it never looked like my own natural beautiful dark brown color! Most hair dye is incredibly toxic and this isn’t something that is worth it for me to do…I just can’t stand that those chemicals are being absorbed into my scalp. So I stopped fighting my gray and I decided to be happy with my hair no matter the color!
But I have to admit that I often look longingly at my daughter’s hair. She has the same gorgeous color my hair used to be. It is just beautiful. I am so happy for her but I confess it does make me miss my hair from when I was younger! And I am not even that old…what turned me hair so gray so soon? I am not even 40 yet!
I came across something recently that changed everything. I heard about a product that was not actually a hair dye so it wasn’t toxic. I do not really know how it works but I trusted that it would work enough to try it out. It’s called Hairprint. It was Mother’s Day today and so I finally had some time to myself to test it. My husband was shocked that I would try something so new the day before leaving for a trip to Hawaii but hey…I like to take risks and if my gray was going to be gone what better place to enjoy it than Hawaii?!
So if Hairprint isn’t a hair dye…what is it?
I’ll tell you what it isn’t: a hair dye. Hairprint is a way of replenishing brown/black hair’s natural pigment while strengthening the overall hair structure. I don’t really know…all I know is that Hairprint uses eight ingredients to activate some kind of melanin pigment in your hair follicle so it basically makes your hair pigment the same as it used to look when you didn’t have gray hair! Unlike hair dyes, which work by chemically damaging hair in order to make it porous enough to absorb the dye color, Hairprint works naturally with the way your hair acquires color while preserving its overall health. What could be better than this?!
What are the Hairprint ingredients?
According to the Hairprint website, the ingredients in Hairprint are:
Baking soda is what we use at home for baking and cleaning. Mucuna pruriens extract is made from velvet beans. Sodium carbonate is made from salt and limestone. Ferrous and manganese gluconate are both vitamin supplements. Hydrogen peroxide is made of oxygen and water and naturally occurs in the hair follicle. Carbomer is an inert thickener used in shampoos and pharmaceuticals. Diatomaceous earth is a naturally occurring sedimentary rock made from ancient deposits of hard-shelled algae.
N.B. The concentrations of hydrogen peroxide we use are between 1% and 1.5%, a fraction of what one gets in drugstore peroxide. In conventional hair dyes, peroxide is used to break open the hair, and can be up to a 12-15% concentration. We do not use peroxide to open the hair cuticle (which is very damaging) but rather to oxidize the mucuna pruriens extract. When applied to your hair, the peroxide is virtually gone.”
FYI Carbomer is a petrochemical but the Environmental Working Group lists it as a 0, which is the best possible rating, so in this case I am going to give it a pass!
My Experience with Hairprint
I have very thick and curly hair and so I knew I would need more than your average human to get my gray out. It turns out it is recommended that for my first time using Hairprint, I should use two Hairprint kits. And so I did. I applied it according to the following video instructions and made the following modifications for my super gray thick, curly hair…
For normal hair, use one Hairprint kit (get your Hairprint kit here). For thick hair that is longer than shoulder length, use two kits as follows:
Use the first kit and then use the second kit right after. It took me longer but was worth it. The gray was mostly covered up after the first kit but doing it again really covered it up fully. I am happy with the results! Apparently after the first time, I won’t need to use two kits again, just one will do! And it will likely stay gray free for 4-6 months! I can’t wait to see how long it lasts. If it lasts 3 months I would be thrilled and is a major improvement to what I used to have to do when I dyed my hair chemically.
In my before after photo, the second image is after I used the first kit. It worked pretty well but I knew I needed another round so I used the second kit. Fantastic results in my final photo!
It was quite messy so my tips are to ensure you have two very old towels that you don’t mind getting permanently stained and dirty. Ensure you are very careful with the dye and that you wear the gloves. I got a bit on my wall in my bathroom because I was careless but I was able to get it off easily with soapy water. Do not get it on your clothes as it will stain.
I used my kitchen sink to wash in between applications and that worked well. There is a fantastic and extensive FAQ section on their website that covers exactly how to apply the product in any case including if you are currently color-treating your hair with chemical hair dye and how to transition to Hairprint. I do not have any experience with that as I haven’t colored my hair for years so please check that out if you currently color your hair.
I am THRILLED with this product. It didn’t smell like anything and didn’t give me any asthma or headaches or anything. All it gave me is beautiful brown hair just like I remember it! Now that is what I like in a product: it works!
CLICK HERE TO GET YOUR HAIRPRINT and get rid of your gray hair for good…NATURALLY!
Have you used Hairprint before? Please comment to share your own experiences and provide your tips for us! I am just so happy to have such a fantastic option here to appear my young beautiful self again!
I’ve been using Hairprint for just under a year- 6 times. I do it every 6 weeks or so, because while the color lasts on the part that has been treated, any new growth will continue to grow out gray. So you will get roots, just like with a regular dye. I never used any dye on my hair before this, and like Lindsey I have thick, coarse, curly hair. Mine is also long- to the middle of my back. I am on the subscription program (you can save 15% and get free shipping) and I order an extra set of pretreatment packets at $1 per pack. I use two of them before treating my hair and that seems to help (I do that because it’s very long and thick and coarse). I only used one box the first time I did it and that worked well but without quite as much coverage. I have medium brown hair and some of the gray hairs turned sort of blonde instead of brown (but weren’t gray anymore). My cosmetologist sister helped me apply and she was astonished at how well it worked. I echo the fact that it gets messy. You do want old towels you don’t care about and if you use the shower or anything else, the treatment splatters. It’s easy to clean up when done right away on things like wood, tile, or sinks, but don’t let it sit. It will stain fabric, including shower curtains. I use an old shower curtain and my shower. I also bought a cape from Sally’s Beauty Supply that I wear while putting it on and letting it set (because it will stain skin if you let it sit on your skin). Other tips…if you have a dry scalp, the black dye can sit on your scalp and create little blobs. I have had luck getting these off by waiting until the whole treatment is done, then putting oil (any kind- olive oil, canola oil, almond oil) on my scalp and letting it sit for 10-15 min, then taking an old lice comb I had from my daughters and running that through my conditioner treated hair. Then I wash it and dry like normal. But I always do this treatment on a Friday night so I have the weekend to recover. Bottom line- I like it, it doesn’t have nasty chemicals, and I don’t have gray looking hair anymore which makes me feel a little better. It wasn’t worth chemical treatments to me but I’m under 40, too, and just didn’t want to be gray quite yet. I don’t feel like it’s changed my curl structure and they talk about it making hair softer. I don’t know for sure that I would go there- the only downside is my hair seems to have a few more split ends than it used to- but I’m also cutting my hair less frequently and wouldn’t want to blame all of that side effect on the Hairprint. I recommend it. (It does only work for brown/black hair- but I heard they are working on a blonde product.)
Thank you for sharing your experience and review Keturah! I trust you so much to do your research and also to give us thorough facts on your results! I love the tip about the cape…I definitely need that to be prepared for next time. Once I order one I will include a link above!
Great! One other tip I forgot to mention- their video instructions are really good and I definitely recommend watching them. The application brush they include works well (the pointy tip is used for separating and parting the hair, then the paintbrush end for application of the product). You want to apply at the roots, separate and part and then apply to the next section over, the videos should help you understand what to do. My newer idea is that after I applied Hairprint to the top of my head and blobbed the leftovers and massaged it on the long part of my hair, I take a brush and brush out my hair to get it on the ends and that has made for a more uniform application. I don’t actually ever use a brush in regular life so I just took an old brush and used that instead. (I also follow the Curly Girl hair approach and do conditioner wash only for my hair, along with non-silicone hair products.) Hope this all helps Hairprint newbies!
According to Hairprint’s FAQ’s the treatment lasts 3-6 weeks. I’m wondering why you say it might last 3-6 months? Thanks!
I am so excited to find out about this product! I’ve been slowly going gray for about 2 years now and I’ve been trying to decide what to do. My hairstylist charges over $100 to color hair and I cannot justify spending that much money on my hair. I’m glad to learn of a safer, cheaper alternative!
Does it work on red hair , or does it turn it brown ?
I just recently switched from Henna to Hairprint and will probably never go back. Although I don’t have gray roots, just many strands that have increased over the last 2 years, I am impressed by how well it covered them. Hairprint took me just over an hour for one kit. Even though it took a long time, I prefer it over Henna (you don’t have to sleep with it on and your hair doesn’t smell like grass for 3 days). I recommend before starting to watch the instructional video provide on their website. This really helped me with time management.
Does it work on African American hair?
I don’t know…all I know is that their website is great at answering these kinds of questions!