Dear Beauty Brains,

I recently went on a hair-dyeing adventure and tried to color my hair on my own. I got some boxes from Target and dyed my hair a very dark brown. Unfortunately, my golden-brown, medium-fine hair didn't hold the color too well. After about a week of washing (and I was washing every other day), the color had faded a LOT. It's still noticeably darker than my original color, but it isn't anywhere near as dark as it was when I first dyed it. I asked a friend who works at a salon why this happened, and she told me that box kits are designed to dye "the thickest and coarsest" hair out there, so using that on my relatively fine hair blew the cuticle open and consequently let all the lovely color leak out pretty quickly. I was wondering if you could give some insight into what chemically happens when you dye your hair, how differences in hair type/color affect what you can and should do when dying your hair, why they can dye all types of hair effectively in a salon, etc. Any recommended books or resources would also be appreciated!

Thanks,
Shannon