Hairstyles for 2006 –
Dark Hair will be In for Spring, Fall
and Winter
By Alexis Arenas
I’ve been looking at dark hair again and loving it. For 2006 I see deep, dark, rich browns being really exciting, especially with highlights. I’m also liking black for the first time in a couple of years. I think black goes great with pink (not in your hair silly), so if you are hitting the town in vibrant dresses think about darkening your hair to create a lovely and highly visible contrast.
Coordinating Fashion and Hairstyles in 2006
Keyword: Contrast
I think contrast is another big word for hairstyles this year. Not that you want a lot of contrast within your hairstyle, but rather that you want to develop contrast between your hair and your clothing or apparel. For instance if you are sporting brunette, brown, or black hair right now reach for that peach, lemon, or lime colored dress. If you are blonde grab a brown or black piece to wear. Contrast is fun, bubbly and playful. Make it one of your 5 key words for the year.
Dark Hair – Starting Short, Going Long
Short Hair
Short hair can be great in blonde or dark, either way you want to have highlights integrated to give depth and interest to your hair. This is a lovely example of highlighting with a chestnut brown base. You can see the highlights help to add activity to what might otherwise be fairly drab hair. Also notice the other important element of this style – layers. Even with short hair you want to be getting plenty of layering to help you build volume and movement.
Faux Short Hair – Wear it Up in 2006
A faux short look can be hot. This jet-black look sans highlights works great as a very stark look. This flat coloring will help you develop heaps of contrast in your style, if you want something unique – do it all black. Then put it up in the back with a simple twist and without much shaping at all your hair becomes an art piece unto itself. Beware, this look is for the bold.
If you’re feeling more shy tonight, another great faux short hairstyle is the classic bun. This is also a great look for hair without highlights and can be done in many shades from medium blondes to reds, brunettes, and blacks. If you want to make it quirkier I would suggest something more eccentric than the flower - go for a plastic bird or a Barbie doll.
Long Dark Hair – Wear it In Deep Black or Brunette with Highlights
Long, black hair is looking good to me for 2006. I wanted to show you this multi-layered, not-quite-curled-end-flip that lets the hair hang way down. Be sure to use a curl-defining product that will help separate and sustain this look. I like the whimsical yet sophisticated nature of this hairstyle.
This is a punky rendition of the long and dark. Again, you can see that the highlights in this hairstyle work to create a lot of depth and interest; if this were a single tone of hair it wouldn’t really have any special qualities at all. This hairstyle helps to point out two key points about hair for 2006 – Highlights can add interest to otherwise lackluster hair and sloppy can sometimes be chic.
The main lesson to take away from this last example is – boooring! While she certainly has more sophistication and class than the punky image above, her hairstyle is staid, almost placid without the highlights of the above style. What highlighting exists is far too subtle for 2006 – I want to see some action, girls!
Hairstyles for 2006 are pretty wide open, follow these suggestions and I guarantee you hairstyle and fashion success. My last piece of advice today: If you want to add depth to black hair do very dark highlights in purple, brown, and/or red. Another series of colors I see being great on most women this year, especially for a summer and fall hair colors are reds. Look for my upcoming article on great red hairstyles for 2006.