Bleached Hair and Perming

Bleached permed hair
Photo: Aaron Amat/Shutterstock
Q: Can I have my hair bleached blonde and then get a curly perm on the same day? If so, what should come first: the bleaching or the perm?
 
A: Most hair salons won't perform both a bleaching service and a perm during the same appointment, and there's good reason for this cautious approach. When these services are done together, stylists typically schedule the perm first, followed by the color service anywhere from one to two weeks later.
 
The timing matters because of how these chemical processes interact with each other. During a perm, your hair goes through a complex chemical transformation where the natural disulfide bonds are broken down and then reformed in a new pattern to create curls. The final step of this process involves using hydrogen peroxide as a neutralizer, which works through oxidation to restore those disulfide bonds in their new curly configuration.
 
Here's where things get tricky: that same hydrogen peroxide used in the neutralizing step can actually lighten or completely alter your hair color. If you've already bleached your hair to that perfect blonde shade, the perm's neutralizer might lighten it even further than you intended, potentially taking you from a beautiful honey blonde to an unwanted platinum or even white tone. Even worse, it could create uneven color results or completely distort the shade you worked so hard to achieve.
 
When you do get your hair bleached after perming, your stylist will need to exercise extra caution throughout the entire process. The perming chemicals leave your hair significantly more porous than it was before, which means the hair shaft is essentially more "open" and ready to absorb whatever you put on it. This increased porosity makes your hair much more receptive to the bleaching agents, causing the lightening process to happen much faster than it would on virgin or previously untreated hair.
 
This accelerated processing time can be both a blessing and a curse. While it might seem convenient that your hair will lighten more quickly, it also means there's a much higher risk of over-processing, breakage, or achieving a lighter result than you actually wanted. Your stylist will likely need to use a lower volume developer, check your hair more frequently during processing, and may even need to apply the bleach in multiple sessions to avoid damaging your newly permed curls.
 
Patience really pays off when you're planning both services. Giving your hair that week or two to recover between treatments allows the cuticle to settle down somewhat and gives you the best chance of achieving both the curl pattern and color you're hoping for without compromising the health of your hair.
 
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See also:
 
Is it risky to perm my bleached hair?
 
Can I apply semi-permanent color to permed hair on the same day?
 
Is it ok to use at-home color after I got a body wave?