I haven't colored my hair with Henna, but I do some mehndi or 'temporary tatooing' with henna because of my daughter, and my friend did the hair dyeing.  My only tip is to be careful of your skin because it will take up the color easily.  I don't know what the dye kits say, but if you use vaseline on the hair line and of course gloves on the hands you'll be less likely to stain yourself.

I just ordered hena for my hair! I’m so excited about it. I have been dying it copper for decades. No longer! My hair has become a “hobby”. It’s BSL now but I’m growing it past my waist and looking at making my own hand carved wooden hair sticks.

From the research I have done, it’s very important to only use pure henna if you have chemically treated hair. The drugstore henna colours (Colora) have the metals and salts in them that can ruin your hair if applied on previous chemically dyed hair giving you weird colours!

Here is some henna information that I have discovered recently. If you are an experienced henna user and some of this info is incorrect, please let us know. I want as much info as I can possibly get going in.

You can get pure henna powder, body art quality is best (BAQ), at a lot of places on the net or at just about any Indian grocery/goods store, where it’s considerably cheaper and just as good. Just make sure it’s pure henna powder. Any pure henna powder will work for hair, it doesn’t need to be triple sifted but will rinse out easier if it is. There are a lot of different kinds on the market: jamilla, rajasthani, rashan, ashfan, mumtaz, yemen and many more, all are pure henna powder and will do a good job, however, the older it is the less dye content it will have, but it will still work. Also, you can tone it down by not leaving it on as long or by watering it down with yogurt or conditioner after it is mixed, if you don’t really want copper red added to your hair. Henna only comes in the one copper red colour. If the box is for another colour henna, it’s not pure henna. That said, you can mix it with other organic herbs, like cassia, to get less red, or indigo to make it blacker. Indigo is black herbal dye but doesn’t always go well with chemically treated hair, unlike henna and cassia.

Henna coloured hair will be very bright orange at first, but will fade and deepen in 2-3 days. Pure henna powder is permanent. You don’t flirt with it, you marry it. You will only need to do the roots henceforth and the odd gloss to brighten it up and return the lush red tones if you have faded it with sun, chlorine, etc.

Henna is completely organic and natural and will not harm your hair. You can repeat the application as many times as you want without damage, but it will get darker with each application. Henna bonds with the protein in your hair to strengthen it, making it stronger and in better condition.

Some places recommend mixing it with a mild acid, like vinegar or lemon juice for better dye release but it will make it more drying. You can combat this by adding a bit of olive oil to prevent this. Henna will work through oil.

Mixing it with hot water and letting it sit in a very warm place will give you better dye release too. You only need some lemon juice combined with hot water for good dye release, not all lemon juice. When it is mixed and has sat for a bit, freeze it. Freezing the mixed henna helps break down the cell walls and makes for complete dye release when thawed. If you freeze the mixed henna, you don’t have to wait for further dye release when it is thawed. Also, you can mix it when it’s convenient to do so, freeze it and then wait to take it out and thaw when you have time to do it. All left over mixed henna can be frozen for later use. Some people mix large amounts and freeze it in ice cube trays for quick root applications. It prevents the pwder from aging on the shelf after you buy it. (I’m going to do this.)

There are no Indian grocery store near me so I had to order it online and pay more.

For the Canadians, here is a list of online Canadian suppliers that I found. They have different shipping costs, ranging from $5.95 to $12 but, at least, there won’t be any customs surprises or duty charges, as it all comes from within Canada.

Hennaart in Edmonton – I just orderd 300g of their H.A.R.T. BAQ

Mehndiskinart in BC

Mehndiandmore sells BAQ powder $5/cup

Dragonfly Designs in Edmonton

Atlantic Henna in New Brunswick

Henna4you

Healing Body Art

Henna Vancouver

I am so exicted about doing this, and a little nervous! I will never again have to buy commercial chemical hair dye to be a red head and the red doesn’t fade, either! As my hair gets longer, it would get to be more and more trouble and expense to keep dyeing it with chemical dyes. Not with henna! I’m so exicted! I researched and read everything I could about henna before I ordered it.

I bought BAQ henna because I also might, just maybe, want to do a few body art paintings for friends who have asked me about it and it wasn’t much more expensive. i can’t wait for it to get here!