Arctic Fox review: Transylvania on untreated hair

I recently came across the brand Arctic Fox, as I was browsing on Instagram. I’ve been after blue black hair for a long while now and saw a post depicting the most perfect shade of Veronica Lodge gorgousness that I have been dreaming of. With a quick search I found that not only is this brand cruelty free and vegan, they also donate 15% of profits to animal charities.. I immediately purchased a bottle of Transylvania. Although it is an American company, they sell their products on amazon.co.uk so I was able to receive it in under 2 days. 

I gave up traditional hair dyes a few years back, as they always left my hair dry and frizzy. My hair has completely grown out, having only been treated with Lush henna from a few months back that is completely faded out of my hair. I was sceptical about what the results would really be like on virgin hair  after watching many tutorials recommending bleaching it first (no thanks), also because this it is a semi permanent treatment without any harsh chemicals.

Excuse the stains!

The application:

This dye comes in a bottle just like a shampoo, so it is very simple to get started. First I put some vegelene around my hairline and on my ears so my face wouldn’t turn blue, then I put some gloves on (very important step!) and squeezed about half the bottle into a bowl and applied the dye to my freshly washed (without conditioner) dry hair, with my fingers and worked my way from the roots to the tips. I read it’s best to put a shower cap on but I didn’t have one to hand so tied a plastic bag around my head (it was a good look.) Once I had the bag on my head I used a blow dryer on low to heat up the dye. I did this extra step because I read a few posts about how to get the dye to last longer and I thought since I am attempting this on my untreated hair, I should do the extra work. The bottle says to leave it in for at least 30 minutes but you can leave it in for as long as you like for more dramatic results. I didn’t have much going on for the afternoon so I ended up leaving it in for about 3 hours.

I was worried about washing it out in the shower after reading about how the blue stains everything, so I stuck my head in the kitchen sink and rinsed it out using cold water. It took maybe 10 minutes to rinse it out and get somewhat clear water draining off my hair. Really not as bad as I was expecting but I do have pretty short hair. While I was rinsing, some dye ran across my face and left me with some very blue skin. Luckily my super drug brand face wipes took the blue away no problem. I left my hair to dry before bed so my wet hair wouldn’t stain my pillows.

The results:

The next morning my pillows were just fine and it didn’t seem to stain any more of my body, though when I was straightening my hair, my hands turned a lovely shade of blue. I absolutely love the colour it came out and was exactly what I had in mind. Indoors it looks raven black and when I step into the sun, the blue really shows through.

before and after

Conclusion:

I am blown away with how well it took to my virgin hair. It is too early to know what the lasting power is like, but I will do an update in a few weeks to see how things are going.

Another great thing about this dye is that you can mix colours as you please to achieve exactly what you are dreaming of. I was considering purchasing the colour Poseidon (a deep, vivid blue) to mix in with the black, but the blue in Transylvania ended up coming through more than I thought, so I didn’t need it.

UPDATE

It has been almost 3 weeks since applying the colour. I’ve washed my hair 6 times with a sulphate free shampoo and have been conditioning as usual. My shower water still runs blue, but I think most of the blue tint has washed out, now my hair is more of a deep brown/black, which I like as well. Near the top of my head has faded a bit, most likely because of washing, as it has not been all that sunny in London recently. I am still really happy with the colour and and texture.