Salon stylists’ chalk yields new ’do hues

CHICAGO — First there were feathers, then the Hunger Games braid took over. Now there’s a new hair trend just as easy to embrace — coloring strands with craft-store chalk. No hairdressers, no complicated instructions, no great expense.

Everyone from hipsters and children to Hollywood celebrities is embracing the runway fad for brightly colored hair, using soft pastel chalk.

“Hair stylists and colorists, they’re artists at their core, so they’re always fooling around with things from the arts-and -crafts store,” said Kristin Perrotta, Allure magazine’s executive editor. “Somewhere along the line a few of them realized there were soft pastels you could use to leave color on your hair.”

The advantage? The chalks wash out in the shower, allowing for temporary rocker style.

“There’s no commitment,” Perrotta said. “This is your opportunity to go crazy for whatever time you want. Even if you’re a super-preppy woman who works in a library, on the weekend you can have purple stripes in your hair.”

Color-streaked hair first popped up on the catwalks two to three years ago, featured by designers such as Prabal Gurung, Prada and Jean Paul Gaultier, Perrotta said. But the look really took off when reality TV star Lauren Conrad featured hair chalking on her blog, The Beauty Department.

“There’s really one person to credit for the chalking trend: It’s Lauren Conrad,” Perrotta said.

Conrad’s hairdresser, Kristin Ess, said beauty professionals have used the chalks to color hair for a while. She credits the proliferation of online beauty blogs for turning the tool into a trend.

“Usually it was secret, so top secret,” said Ess, who cofounded The Beauty Department with Conrad. “But now the way that things are, it’s so easy to get it out there.”

The steps aren’t complicated: Take a piece of chalk, run it along the strand of hair until it’s colored and if necessary pull the hair through a curling iron. If you have darker hair the chalk may stick easier if you dampen the strand first. It’s important to use soft pastel chalks — the kind artists use, not oil-based chalks or sidewalk chalks.

To remove, shake or brush your hair to dust out the chalk before getting into the shower. Then wash your hair. The chalk can get messy, so wear plastic gloves.

Kandee Johnson, a celebrity makeup artist and beauty and style blogger, posted a hair chalking how-to video on Youtube in February. So far it has gotten more than 630,000 hits.

“People were sending me pictures from websites,” she said. “I didn’t think people were going to be that excited over it. I did not think it was going to be that popular at all.”

Johnson thinks the attraction comes because chalking is temporary and inexpensive — a whole set of chalks can cost between $6 and $8.