A colour genius and award-winner, Paul Dennison is colour director at the Ken Picton destination salon in Cardiff. Out of the salon, Paul also travels extensively for L’Oréal Professionnel and has a wealth of experience in education and interpreting trends for artistic and salon work. Here he talks us through his insight into the coming season and 2018 generally:
• Block colouring: One of this season’s strongest colouring techniques will be block colouring. Haircuts are getting shorter and more graphic so to complement the geometry, we’re playing with strong, bold global colour placements (think Vidal Sassoon-esque). This trend is not for the faint-hearted client as we’re using opposing colours in panels to create a statement finish.
• Evolution of balayage: For longer hair this season we’re taking freehand highlighting to a more traditional place. Icy pieces will be brighter and darker pieces will be much darker to create much less subtle ribbons of colour. We’re taking the colour to the root in some places so think back to that stronger highlight of a few years ago but done freehand for a modern twist.
• Pastelage: The launch of L’Oréal Professionnel My Colourful Hair has allowed us to take hair to a more playful place with the Pastelage technique. We’re toning the ends of balayage with lilacs, pinks, blues and greens in pastel shades and diluting them with clear and layering to create that mermaid-hair effect. Clients are able to achieve a completely bespoke look as we can create custom formulations to complement their base – expect to see a pastelised tangerine coming through as one of THE colours of the season. [continues below gallery…]
• Atomic Blonde: Thanks to the release of the new film, and with celebrity adopters like Katy Perry and Cara Delevingne, we’ll be seeing the super clean, white blonde everywhere this season. The key is to keeping to even from root to tip and no yellow! Think a very vanilla, cool girl blonde with a global application.
• Blueberry: Brunettes this season have gone iridescent and super shiny thanks to this cool blueberry shade. It’s neither blue nor purple and gives hair this incredible hue that will make people do a double take. It’s the evolution of the mocha and espresso colours that we’ve seen over the last few A/W seasons. The key to the look is high shine so I’m using L’Oreal Smartbond in all my colours for healthy, glossy brunettes.
• Russet: Reds this season are going to be much more copper. Not bright orange but not red, this cool orange gives reds an edge (think Kirsten Dunst and Florence Welch). I’m applying this in many ways for clients from global, to pastelage and balayage.
