Colour fast: rapid roots and high-speed highlights are no longer just a dream

From turbo-charged balayage to lunchtime highlights, there’s a wave of quick dye jobs sweeping London
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Emma McCarthy18 January 2016

Once upon a time, having perfect hair meant devoting hours and hours to a salon chair. Fast forward to 2016 and most of us would rather skip the extra-long head massage in favour of a few extra precious minutes.

Thanks to the capital’s sharpest scissor hands and walk-in blow-dry bars, getting trimmed and tousled with enough time left over to grab a Pret sandwich on our lunch break is no fairy tale. But as anyone who’s planned their six-weekly salon appointments for the year will know, it’s not so simple to cut corners when it comes to hair colour. Now it seems the wait is finally over, as a host of salons are promising to deliver rapid roots and high-speed highlights.

Trevor Sorbie’s salons in Covent Garden and Hampstead have launched a super-fast colour menu of services you can squeeze into your lunch hour. Taking only 15 minutes and designed to be easily tagged on to a quick trim or express blow-dry, the new Quick Colour Top-Up Services use permanent or semi-permanent dye to refresh and extend the lifespan of your colour.

Choose from Root Blur — a partial application of colour in key places to blend away those unsightly greys; Balayage Blend — hand-painted highlights placed around the hairline to refresh existing balayage; or Hi-Light Fix, which uses strategically placed foils. Each is available for £50, while the Shine Intensify service (£35) works like a clear nail varnish for hair and leaves locks with a glossy, mirror shine.

Tried and tested: Hair Salons in London

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Jack Howard — resident colour expert at west London salon Paul Edmonds and the man widely credited with bringing balayage to the capital — has also turned his hand to curating quicker colour. His New York Lights service (from £140) involves hand-painted highlights applied at the backwash to save valuable minutes.

“Freehand colour is modern and has a quicker processing time,” says Howard of the new technique, which already has fans including Poppy Delevingne and Ana Beatriz Barros. “My New York Lights are focused around the face and are so quick to do I call them ‘lunch hour highlights’ — it takes 10-15 minutes to apply at the backwash, then just 20 minutes maximum to develop, followed by a 20-minute blow-dry.”

London’s Rush salons are also staying true to their name with a series of Speedy Services devoted to offering great hair colour in half the time of a regular appointment. Created in collaboration with L’Oréal and the salon’s colour director Chris Williams, the menu includes Express Ombre, Fast Lights, Blend & Go (for disguising grey) and Flash Colour (to brighten your natural colour), available from as little as £45.

Want to go for something a little less subtle? Organic colour specialist Karine Jackson — a firm favourite with Lily Allen — is launching colour lessons in her Covent Garden salon to make experimenting with rainbow shades at home quicker, easier and cheaper.

“In the past year, those with blonde or bleached hair are really experimenting with a whole spectrum of shades, but they can’t always afford to visit a salon every time they want to switch up their statement shade, so they try it out at home,” says Jackson. “Of course, doing your colour yourself at home — especially with colours this bright — can cost more in the long run if you need it corrected.”

With this in mind, Jackson is offering free 15-minute colour consultations to help dye-hard fans find the perfect shade along with expert advice on how to mix and apply the colour at home when it suits you.

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