After a failed bleaching attempt by an overconfident niece (not me), my aunt was left with brassy banana yellow hair with level 5 roots and spots where the bleach did not sufficiently lighten the shaft. I used the instructions provided by Clairol's Pro site for fixing overly lightened hair using a tint back. I used 20vol developer with 2N to compensate for the extremely bleached out color, added 1/2 oz of 155R-Red to rebuild the pigment, and tinted the hair in 3 sections, ends, midshaft, and then roots. Total processing time was 30 minutes, 30 minutes for ends, 25 minutes for midshaft up to the demarcation line, and 10 minutes for the roots above the demarcation line. She ended up with almost perfectly even level 5 with some variation based on how bleached each section was. The color did fade due to the porosity of the hair, but after 2 months, she was somewhere between a level 6 and 7. A touch up with 10vol developer has corrected her hair once more. We will continue to do this until she has grown out the over-processed ends. It smells nice, gives great shine, and in my opinion lasts a long time and fades gently.

This is probably the best color I have ever used.. I used both dark ash blonde and light ash brown, and I feel the ash tones in this line are stronger than any I've used so far in salon or myself. That beats Colorsilk, Wella, Preference, Natural Instincts etc. Let me tell you, I have resistant warmth so for the color to actually bring my color to the ash side rather than just neutralize it, well that's a first. The color is extremely gentle. However, they DO pull dark. A full two shades dark in my experience. Light ash brown turned dark ash brown, and after it faded a little bit (which it did slowly; these dyes have great staying power) it faded to a med ash brown at best. I couldn't give this 5 lippies because of that, but to be honest, I don't know if you can find an ash dye that doesn't do this.

Oh and one more thing: it adds amazing shine.

I thought I had already written a review for this! One of the best dyes on the market. I am quite familiar with hair dye and do quite a few of my friends hair (even though I am not a pro - I come from a family of hairdressers). This is a must to have at home to fix any type of hair disaster or to just use to get natural haircolor without much damage. I usually use 10 vol developer for demi permanent results. i like to mix a nuetral blonde shade with an ash. The ash definitely tones the red that I have (and hate) in my hair, and the nuetral helps to cover the gray. It will not lighten your hair so I usually do some heavy highlights through a cap and then use this to tone and cover those grays at the root. There is a lot of flexibility with his product. I usually just put some conditioner at the ends so that they dont soak up too much color and leave on my roots for 10 to 20 mins. Then add a little water and leave on the rest of my hair for only a few minutes. It keeps my hair a medium to light blonde and the grays get a nice highlighted effect. Also great to use for low lights when my hair gets over highlighted. You can pull some sections through a cap, or just brush on a dark or medium blonde and it adds great depth. Very natural results.

Great great product, my level 6-7 hair loves to turn orange, yellow or both at the drop of a hat, so I decided to try this with 20 volume creme developer to make it permanent, I left it on for 10 minutes since this was my first time, it did a fantastic job at covering old highlights, funky bleach jobs and tacky blonde, it came out a beautiful color, I used 153D (light ash blonde) it comes out medium blonde with champagne highlights, ver pretty, multi-dimensional and it looks extremely natural (my natural color is level 4 ash) will use again when my hair turns color again but will leave it for 20 minutes.

This is great for fixing color mistakes/toning/tweaking color. I have used this to fix hot roots and have also used this to make toning conditioners to tweak my haircolor (once I got an ash color at a salon that looked a bit green and a toning conditioner made with Second Nature fixed that). When used with a ten volume developer, it seems to be super gentle and produces subtle, unharsh results. The next time I am due for a root touch up, I am thinking of just using this instead of being disappointed yet again at the salon.
UPDATE: Used this today for a full-on root touch up and refresher. And it came out spectacular. This is the first time- ever, ever, EVER- that I have not gotten hot roots when doing my hair at home. I used 1 oz of 10 volume developer and 1/2 oz of the medium ash browm (violet base) and 1/2 oz of light ash brown (blue-violet base). I touched up my roots and left it on for 20 minutes. Then added some conditioner to what was left of the mixture and distributed through my ends and left on for an additional 5 minutes. I then thoroughly rinsed the dye out, lighlty shampooed, used a ton of conditioner, rinsed, and then used Roux porosity control for about 1 minute. The results were even and natural looking from root to tip. It did come out just a teeney bit darker than I wanted. But I am willing to bet than after I wash it for the first time in 48hrs, it'll be great. And even though it's a deep medium brown, it still retains some shimmer of natural looking reddish/goldish tones. This also completely covered my grays (I am maybe 5% grays) and I wasn't even expecting that! If I can find a salon in my area that uses this brand of color, I may treat myself to getting it professionally done on occassion- as I do make a mess. Updated rating to 5 stars. Additionally, this is the first dye I have ever used that does not at all stain the skin- if you get it on your forehead or use it on your eyebrowns, it completely and totally washes off from the skin. No dyed-looking scalp for 2 days with this dye- it all rinses off. Plus it did not make my hair tangle up as I was washing it or leave it dry. Wow. :)
*UPDATE* - I can't get over how rich and lustrous the color looks. For such a dark shade, it does not look un-natural at all- it's almost as if each individual hair is a slightly different shade. So far, very happy and impressed.

My mother has been trying to get me to put in blonde highlights for years. My complexion is too warm to look good with the kind of frosted effect she has in mind, so I have resisted. Finally she decided to gift me with a visit to her hairdresser, in the apparent hopes that this would get me to see the platinum light. Luckily for me, her hairdresser thought I would look better with strawberry blonde highlights. Luckier still, she was right, and luckiest of all, my mother liked them too. But all good things must come to an end. My roots started showing, and this look was too high maintenance for me to be able to afford to keep up with. I needed to cover the obvious gray but I didn't want to cover over my highlights completely. I read that the Second Nature was no lift, creating a subtle change. This sounded ideal for my purposes, as I was hoping to mute the break between my roots and the highlights without totally obliterating the highlights. I picked the light red brown for that reason. The packaging is pretty easy to use. It's premeasured 2 ounces so all you need to do is mix with developer. The packaging indicates that volume 10 will give you long lasting results but 20 will give you near permanent results. I decided to err on the side of 10. The one thing it doesn't even hint at is how long to leave the product on your hair. I usually leave semi permanents on for 20 minutes so I went with that. The results were exactly as I'd hoped! My roots are no longer so obvious, but the hint of highlights still showing gives the overall color a lot of depth. This was perfect for what I wanted it for and if I find myself in a similar situation in the future I will definitely use it again.

This stuff is marketed as a tintback and it works really well for that purpose. I went a little overboard with some at-home highlights and needed to tone down the white, brass and yellow streaks, not to mention to cover the zebra stripes left from the holes in the cap!! (eeep!) This worked perfectly. I used the 7A Medium Ash Blonde shade and I loved it. Unfortunately, I'm mostly Italian and my dark brown eyes and eyebrows looked goofy (to me) with the pretty blonde so I went back to brown shortly afterwards. But if I ever decide to play with bleach again, I would definitely keep an emergency bottle of this stuff around just in case I need an emergency tintback. It really toned down the yellow and brass.
If you're wondering - 7A is a violet ash.

I had gotten tired of lightening my hair with Excellence, and wanted to dye-back to my natural dark ash blonde... So I went and bought Second Nature in Dark Ash Blonde at Sally's, along with the Ion Color Brilliance Sensitive Scalp 10 Volume Developer. This Second Nature shade is a violet-based ash, which is unusual as far as I can tell. In the past I had dyed back using Natural Instincts in Coastal Dune, which worked great, except that within two weeks it washed back out to the brassy color I was trying to cover up. The Second Nature did come out a little dark at first... more of a light ash brown, but within a couple weeks it lightened up to a perfect dark ash blonde and has held that shade ever since. Wonderful product which I will definitely repurchase should it ever be necessary!

I'm so very happy with this!
First, I had attempted to highlight my hair with a Loréal Frost and Go. It pulled way too much yellow/orange and looked unnatural
Second, I went to my hairdresser, had her cover up my highlights by highlighting over them. I didn't realize the end result would be SO blonde. I should have had her do low-lights in addition to the highlights.
A few days went by and I really wasn't happy with my hair color. I still had some blotchy yellow/orange and bad roots.
I bought Second Nature in Light Ash Blonde and 10 Volume Developer to do a demi-permanent color.
I'm so very happy with the results. My hair looks very natural. The orange/yellow highlights that were still there (albeit not as much) from my original DIY highlighting job are toned down quite a bit. They are still a teeny bit noticeable to me, but they won't be to anyone else. In a few weeks I may use it again to try and get rid of the remaining color from my botched job.
I'm very happy overall and would definitely suggest this product.

All I can say is, Wow. I'm growing out a highlight from last summer, and my natural color is medium brown; however, it has a lot of red in the base and tends to pull red no matter what OTC color I use. Bought Medium Ash Brown 3V/159D at Sally & used w/equal part 20 vol crème developer in very small amount, just to cover a gray "skunk stripe" in the middle of the top of my head. Left on for 35 min, pulled thru last five min. I was amazed at the color match and best of all, NO RED! Now I'm considering using it to blend in all my highlights and get my natural color back. I'm throwing out all my OTC color kits. This is the best color experience I've ever had, and it saved me so much money over going to a professional. Highly recommended!! continued >>

I have naturally light ash brown hair with about 40% gray. I've been using Excellence Med. Blonde to cover the gray and lighten the rest. Lately I've noticed my hair has gone very light and is getting a little gold even though I use Shimmer Lights shampoo. After reading all these great reviews, I decided to try to go darker but, hopefully, not greener! I was afraid to use light ash brown after some bad experiences with other brands in the past, so I used 1-1/2 oz. med. ash blonde and 1/2 oz. light ash brown and 2 oz. 20 vol. developer and processed for 30 mins. WOW! The color is gorgeous...came out dark ash blonde which was what I was aiming for. No gold or red even though my hair typically pulls gold and lt. orange. Feels great and looks totally natural. My HG for sure! Would even feel comfortable using all light ash brown if it doesn't last long enough.
UPDATE: 4/12/11 Color just doesn't "hold" on gray hair. 2nd time I tried using all light ash brown and turned grays medium blonde and ends medium brown. Sounds like it would look o.k., huh? NOT! Just didn't wear as well as I needed it to. Am now writing a review for L'Oreal Preference Dark Blonde Natural.

This is great stuff! I have dark ash blonde/light ash brown hair and I had been using a high lift blonde hair color which made my hair an ultra light blonde, but I got tired of roots showing every two weeks, so I decided to go back to my natural color. I heard that you don't need to put any color filler on your hair first to do a tintback with Second Nature, so I got the Dark Natural Blonde shade, and I was totally amazed - it matched my roots exactly, and my hair looked so much healthier and shinier, and it had loads of body. I have since returned to the high lift blondes, but if I want to go back to my natural color again, I will most assuredly use Second Nature! In my opinion, there is no better color for tintbacks, corrective color, or going darker.

This is the only color I will use on my hair! It doesn't leave your hair with that "freshly dyed" dull look-it looks rich, shiny and numerous people have complimented me on the color. I highly recommend using the ash shades which are violet based (coming from someone who dislikes red/green tones in her hair). As long as I stay a brunette, I will continue to use this line.

A few weeks ago I bleached my hair and used Special Effects in Joyride, which gave me neon fushia hair. It was cool for a week but it got old quickly and I wanted my ash brown hair back. Hesitant to use permanent color for risk of further damage (my hair was very porous from the bleaching) I tried Second Nature in Medium ash brown. I didn't have any 10 volume developer so I mixed 20 vol. with equal parts of distilled water to make 10 volume. I was hoping for an even, medium to dark brown color. I used a protein filler first and applied the Second Nature for 20 minutes (it developed fast!). I now have beautiful, natural looking medium/dark hair, exactly what I was hoping for, with no weird undertones. This stuff is a godsend for correcting color and I will keep it on hand for when I get tired of the funky bleached colors.

Wow. I am thrilled with my hair color from this product. I just did it today so I cannot say how long it will last but even if it is not very long, I would be willing to use a 20 volume developer to make it permanent.
Just FYI re: my hair before using Second Nature - I had been going to the salon and getting single process color to cover my gray hairs. I have naturally very dark brown hair and my stylist was coloring with a dark red brown that looked good for about two weeks after coloring. Then my hair would do what it always does and turn a coppery shade that I hate. Seems that no matter what, if there is a hint of red, it pulls orange. Grrr. I got to a place where I could not afford to pay for the color anymore so I tried L'Oreal Excellence Creme (OMG that was HORRIBLY orange) and then Natural Instincts. I liked the Natural Instincts pretty well but I hate the wet application. I missed a lot of roots even using a brush. My hair is just so dark that when it is wet, I cannot tell where I am applying the color. Anyway, even the Natural Instincts (Cinnaberry) turned brassy in a short period of time. I remembered that I could find a deposit-only color at Sally's so I read the reviews on here. I found good things about Second Nature and about Radiance. However, a lot of people complained that Radiance pulled too dark so I decided to go with Second Nature. This time I used my best judgment and chose a color with no orange. I got Medium Red Violet Brown and it looks great! It is terrific mix of true red and brown that completely covered all that orange and copper in my hair. Now my hair is well conditioned and I am pleasantly surprised at how much depth this product has to it. I still have a few stray grays but if this color washes out nicely (meaning it does not turn some funky odd shade on it's way out) I will use a 20 v. instead of 10 and that should sufficiently cover them up.
I will see how it fades but so far, I will definitely repurchase this and would recommend to anyone wanting to fix or even brighten their current color. It conditions well, smells good, easy to apply with the Pure White Developer and produces results that are expected. Nothing too dark, nothing too far from the swatch.

I had been growing out my bleached hair and couldn't take it anymore with it reached the half and half point. I used Clairol's Natural Instincts to cover over the entire thing to make it close to my natural shade (light brown). I didn't want to use a permanent color and cause more damage to my hair, so Natural Instincts seemed the way to go. That shade wasn't deep enough to totally cover my bleached ends, so I started going darker, using medium and dark browns, but always in a ash or neutral shade. No matter what I did, it always came out with warmth to the color. I even used their Brass Free medium brown shade, but even that showed warmth; which with my cool skin tone bothered me. Nobody else seemed to notice or care, but I always felt like it was wrong. I have a great hair stylist who understands that I don't have the money to get my hair professionally colored, and she suggested that I look for an ash tone that has a blue/violet ash base instead of a green ash base. I didn't realize there was such a thing! The problem is, drugstore brands don't mark their color with what kind of ash tone, just that it's ash. I headed over to Sally beauty yesterday for some nail polish, and decided to browse the hair color section while I was there. After about 5 minutes, I found Clairol's Second Nature color. Listed as a deposit only ( no damaging lift) color, I picked a shade called Dark Ash Brown that had the base listed as Violet. I also grabbed a bottle of Clairol Pure White Vol. 10 developer since I wanted my results to be more temporary. (volume 20 can be used for longer lasting results.) In total my purchase was (minus the polish) 8 bucks, the cost of what a box of Natural Instincts cost me at Walgreens. The bonus is that the developer bottle has mulitple uses in it (you only use 2 oz. per bottle of color) so the next time I buy my cost will only be around $4.50.
The Process: Having been a NI user, I questioned weither or not to wet my hair before coloring like you do with NI. The bottle didn't say, so I went the the Clairol Professional website ( www.thecreativestudio.com/products/demi_permanent/second_nature_demi ) and read their instructions for their "color balance" technique. (http://makeupalley.com/product/qu.asp?itemid=80798). No wetting needed apparently, so I put it on dry. As it developed you could definitly see the violet undertone in the color gel itself, so I got a little nervous that I was going to end up with purple-brown hair. While waiting the 30 minutes (I have greys I needed to recover) , I decided that even if I did it would be kind of cool and it wouldn't be the worst look I ever had to my hair lol. I rinsed, shampooed and conditioned as usual.
The Result: It came out with a nice deep brown, but not black like some browns can appear. There is no purple cast to it at all, but best of all I finally have a deep brown with NO RED OR BRASSY CAST TO IT! I finally got the shade I wanted!
Final Impression: There is no packaging what so ever, just the bottle of color. For me this is good (as it produces less landfill waste) but that also means no cute instruction booklet, gloves, or applicator bottle. I already had a hair color bowl and brush that I had previously purchased from Sally Beauty really cheap, so that was no biggie. But, for the awesome results I got, plus the cheaper price, this in addition to the trip to Sally Beauty was more than worth it. I will def. buy this again! My new Holy Grail!

As the other reviewer said, this is a no-lift haircolor. They call it color corrective and that's why I bought it. My hair tends to pull red, so I used to always color my hair red. My boyfriend told me that he really didn't like the red so much, so I went brunette. My brunette would always fade out and the red would come through again. I used this product in an ash-brown shade and it actually came out brunette and stayed brunette. I have only used it once. Would probably repurchase.

This is a corrective no lift hairdye sold at Sally's. It's super gentle with high color pigmentation for fixing color mistakes. I used Second Nature with Clairol's 20 volume developer to add color back into my hair after using Jheri Redding Color Fix. I am very happy with the results. There is not a big color selection, but there is all the basic colors there to get corrective color done and my hair color is back on track in the right direction. The results look very natural and rich without looking fake like Clairol Complements. I highly recommend it. I found out about it from Clairol's 1800 number and read about it online at www.Clairolpro.com I would have never known about it if I never called the 1800 number asking how to fix my hair. UPDATE: I love this hairdye. It completely cured my hair of my Radiance Color Gloss disaster. Keep in mind that the 2n is a soft black. I mixed it with 3n, and my hair is a nice soft black with chocolate undertones! It's really nice and I actually like it! Even with the 20 volume developer, I find the color did not lift much or give me hot roots. So this dye it truly deposit only. I use the 20v to make sure the cortex of my hair would open up, blend with the Radiance color already in there, and give a permanent effect, and it did! UPDATE: This haircolor has served it's purpose. I think it has a lot of protein in it, and my hair doesn't feel as soft when I touch it up, but I am still happy how it worked to get my haircolor back on track. I switched to Nutrisse, and I absolutely am loving Nutrisse!!! I would use Second Nature again if I ever has a hairdye disaster, but it's not holygrail material for me.