All Things Bright, Pastel, and Ombre

She walks inside the campus, her hair in a tight bun, her uniform neatly pressed. She smiles as she passes by the security guard by the gate who gives a smile in return. She keeps walking until she is far enough and takes off the hair tie that held her hair in place. Her pastel pink hair cascades down her back. She smiles as people whisper their own different thoughts about it.

People always have their own opinions on colored hair. Some love it and admire the bravery of people who do dye their hair. Others feel like it is a taboo going as far as making fun of people who do color their hair and tagging them as rebels. To Jascel Espinosa and Brendan Apuan, it was a form of self-expression and gaining more confidence in themselves.

All the colors of the Rainbow

“I dyed my hair because I wanted to express myself through colors and fashion. Having a new look made me feel more confident about myself,” Jascel said.

Jascel has dyed her hair numerous times and in various colors. The first time was a dark red in 2014. Being a cosplayer, she had experimented with hair colors to look like the characters she portrays.

Brendan, who now dons long lilac locks, said that having watched anime and cartoons while growing up helped encourage him to dye his hair.

“Growing up, I was exposed to a lot of anime and always found the crazy hairstyles and hair colors fascinating, wanting to be like them,” he said.

He also shared how dying his hair gave him a confidence boost.

“I had fairly low self-esteem growing up and when I started using more unnatural colors, I quickly found that taking control of my own appearance was very empowering. It was a much needed confidence boost, being able to express myself artistically through something that I wear everyday on top of my head.”

Brendan had started coloring his hair in high school saying how he had been a bit of a rebel with these kinds of things adding, “[I] thought I could get away with dying the front of my hair a dark blue.”

He shared how he had not had any experience with hair color at the time and how his hair turned medium brown – far from the dark blue he had hoped.

“I ended up keeping it until everyone with dyed hair got caught and forced to dye their hair black. Including my friend whose hair is naturally brown, for some reason,” he shared.

Sticks and Stones

As it is far from society’s norm, people with bright or pastel colored hair are often judged and noted as “rebels”.

“ Often when I go out, there's always one or two people who look at me as if I were Satan incarnate wearing Hitler's skin as a scarf or something,” Brendan shares to which Jascel adds “there were times that I felt that I was judged, especially when having bright hair colors inside the school, knowing it was against the dress code.”

Brendan said that getting used to all the staring and whispering and just laughing it off really helped him deal with these sort of people.

“Since these people likely weren't exposed to a lot of culture or subculture outside of what they grew up with, and therefore understand anything outside of their comprehension to be ‘bad.’ This applies to a lot of things, to be honest,” he said, adding, “Personally, trying to understand why they choose to judge really helped me block out the negativity.”

“I just didn't mind the judgment, because sticks and stones may break my bones, but words would never hurt me,” Jascel said.

REBELVEAL the inner you

Like Jascel and Brendan, a lot of people have dyed their hair to express who they are. Even Dove in a recently released advertisement said “Your hair, your say.”

“Society seems to be progressing towards a better acceptance of people with colored hair too. I see a lot more people with colored hair now than I did when I first started, and to me, that's a good step forward.” Brendan said.

Brendan also said that the beauty of having colored hair is that it doesn’t have to last forever.

“You can have it for a day, you can have it for a week, you can have it for years, it's never permanent so if you change your mind someday, there's no problem!”

They said that the reason why people are often scared to dye their hair, aside from people judging them, is the damage that it may do.

“Some people are afraid of dying their hair because they think it would heavily damage it, but doing proper research about what hair products to use can prevent damage,” Jascel said.

“It'll take a bit of commitment, so be ready to commit yourself to changes in your shower routine and nightly hair care rituals. Be ready to commit yourself to bleaching as well, especially if you want a lighter shade. It's a necessary evil, but that's the price we pay,” Brendan said, jokingly adding ,” If you can commit to this, you can commit to anything and that's why you should date someone with colored hair *charot*”

“Don't ever be afraid to express yourself through crazy hair colors, the world needs more unicorns,” Jascel said. /CE