Costs Vary For Making A Statement With Hairstyle

Teens today define their own hairstyles with as much or little as they want in terms of color and texture.

What does it cost to achieve some of the hot looks in hair today? Not much if you do it yourself, more if you have a professional do it.

Here are some specifics:

Taking all the color out is called stripping. You can stop there for a white-blond effect or take it to the next step with color. A do-it-yourself strip or bleach kit is $10 at Hot Topic stores.

If you want a professional to do it, you’ll pay around $50.

Putting on color that will wash out with a good shampoo is fairly simple. You can buy temporary colors, often called rinses, at drugstores, beauty supply stores and some grocery stores. One brand is Trend Gel, which sells for $4 at Hot Topic stores.

Permanent color is a more involved process. If your hair is light and you want to go dark, you usually can do it in one process. However, to go from darker to light requires stripping and then a color application. A single color application is $47 in addition to paying for the stripping, while two or more is up in the $100 range.

Do-it-yourself permanent hair color kits from Clairol, L’Oreal and other companies are in the $10 vicinity at drug and grocery stores.

Shaving your head totally or partially is more of a do-it-yourself practice now than in the past. Many barbershops will no longer shave, citing concern about nicks and possible AIDS contamination as the reason.