Style

What Happens When Every Instagram Hair Color Trend Is Combined Into One

by James Hale

If it's one thing that the "color melt rainbow" trend teaches us, it's that all the best beauty fads start on social media. Instagram gives the beauty world plenty of gifts, from getting talented, budding MUAs the attention they deserve to making some truly useful beauty hacks go viral. Now, hairstylist Ruby Devine is taking the site's goods a step further by combining Instagram hair color trends into one jaw-dropping look.

The dye job, which Devine called a "color melt rainbow," melds four trends from the past couple of years together: Rainbow roots, underlights, Lisa Frank hair, and sand art hair. Devine posted the finished look on Instagram, explaining in her caption that she had been planning to do a rainbow dye job for a long time, and realized in the process of applying the dye to her client's hair that she was taking inspiration from the four trends.

To create the wild blend of colors, Devine first lightened sections of her client's hair, then used an array of Pulp Riot colors and color blends, including Nirvana, Area 51, Lemon/Firefly, Nirvana/Cupid, Lava, Cupid Fireball, and Velvet.

The result is absolutely, ridiculously beautiful, with neon colors hidden underneath the client's first layer of hair, but revealed, along with subtler tones and even slight jewel tones, when the layer of hair is pulled up into a knot.

You can see a time lapse of the look's creation on Devine's Instagram, showing how truly complicated implementing it was.

Bustle reached out to Meredith Morris, hairstylist and owner of MAVEN Beverly Hills, to see how to get a dye job like this, how it might affect your hair, and what the upkeep of this look could involve.

First of all, take it to a professional, Morris says. "Do not do this at home. Have realistic expectations," she explains. "Fashion colors are temporary colors. The base of most of these direct dye colors is petroleum, and they don't mix with a developer. The gel-like consistency makes it easier for application."

Easier for application, though, doesn't mean it's easier for upkeep. Morris says "fashion colors" like these are more surface stains than dyes, which means they're temporary and likely to begin fading almost immediately.

"Most of these vibrant colors only last a few shampoos," she says. "Temporary colors are just that, temporary. With UV rays, shampoo, heat styling, basically just living, they will fade."

But if you're willing to manage the upkeep and are prepared for fading, just know that with Devine on your side, it's totally possible to have a glittering slice of the rainbow in your hair.