Suggestions for this hair, please

Ok, a few things.

I don't know if it'll look daft on you.., I don't know what you look like! But, I don't think it looks daft on anyone. Stop thinking like that and you'll carry it off no problem 🙂

If you can manage a highlighting kit, then being careful you can do a bleach. But as you're only doing the front in bits, then it's easy. BUT. You need to use a colour remover first. DO NOT do anything before using a colour remover on the parts you want to dye.

You will have to get your hair to a pale ginger for purple to work and lighter for a dark blue. If you're happy with a dark teal (which looks stunning on everyone btw) then you can use a blue over ginger.

I second the fact that dark teal looks good on everyone! Never seen a person it doesn't suit!

I have a slice of purple and teal-y green in the underside of my brown hair at the moment and I love it!

Don't let your age stop you having the hair you want, age is no barrier.
I am currently 45 and have a hip length lilac/blue/mint gradient.
If you can wear a colour on clothing, the chances are it will suit you as a hair colour

I've added a pic now---sorry, I accidentally posted it as a reply but have told the moderator.  It is a sort of ginger colour now as you can see, would I still need colour remover and bleach on this?

Thanks.

Which moderator? I'm really the only active one at the moment, so I'll sort it out.

That's still a bit too dark, you need it a bit paler than that.

You'd look lovely with some blue and purple (I'm still pushing for real though 😉 )

Are there any colours I could put on without lightening?  I started looking at semi-permanent colours as I thought they might be kinder and less damaging to my hair but if I have to use colour remover PLUS bleach/highlighter it kind of defeats the object a bit. ;D

Also what would I need to do when my roots need re-doing? 

You can put on purple on what you have now. But it'll turn out a super dark purple, mostly looking black or if you use a pink purple it will come out a deep Burgundy, but again mostly looking black. Direct dyes just add translucent colour, so if your base is dark it will look darker. You get to a point where the colour that will show has to be so dark to show that laid over the base colour it just looks black with a hint of colour. It's nice if that's what you're going for.

However. colour removers are non damaging, just a little drying and you might not need to bleach. Even if you do, you'd just need to use a bleach bath which is pretty gentle. When your roots show, just section off the dyed parts and bleach bath the  roots and then redye.

Basically, you need it a bit lighter for the colours to show anything other than mostly black. Blues will just go a bit nasty on hair that red toned and dark. Or just look muddy black.

You won't get a blue over that, maybe a red or a purple, or dark green. I've attached a photo of the colours I've got over a dark and warm base at the moment (Directions Violet and Alpine Green) they start off pretty dark, the purple almost black but then they fade a bit brighter. (photo is of them a couple of weeks faded ) The base colour they are over is the colour of the rest of my hair in the photo. They don't stick very well to my virgin roots though.

Excuse the funny face, that's what concentration looks like on me haha!

Thanks both of you, will need to have a think about it before deciding.  Very wary of using colourB4 as it has so many really bad reviews on a number of other sites.

Maybe  I should just  stick to the adore brown shades rather than box dyes instead.

The bad reviews are normally people who don't use it properly, use a ton of silicone products (which can block the dye coming out etc) or just expect miracles!

I find most of the complaints I see about Colour B4 are from people who think it can return their permanently colour treated hair to their natural colour. I see lots of complaints about it 'turning' hair ginger when in fact it is just removing the tint and revealing the level of lightening the permanent product has done to their hair (most people's hair will go through a ginger stage when lightening). Generally speaking if you have used products containing peroxide you're not going to get back to your natural hair colour, but you are going to remove the tint and provide a more suitable base for your next colour.

I'm not sure if this is even something that might be appealing to you, but what about an ombre look, I had this color when I had my long hair and I really loved it, I believe its called cherry coke or something like that, but it was very flattering on my skin which goes from very pale in the winter to tan in the summer, and it always looked good, but if you went from your current color at the roots and mid lengths and did this color at the bottoms for an ombre look it would definitely give you a different look and its not such a drastic change as going to the crazy color spectrum, and that way if you decide its not enough then you can push your boundaries a little further and maybe go for the crazy colors. If I can find a picture of myself with this on my hair I will definitely insert it later. (fyi I had hair about your color maybe a touch darker and put the color right over top and it was not too dark at all, it looked just like the picture, but it is a permanent color, I don't know of any semis that are similar)

Yes, that is pretty!  It is definitely a colour I could go for.  Thanks for that Emmer1321!

Thanks again, Lorelei and Janine--yes, I appreciate what you say about differing expectations from a product-it was mainly all the comments about smelling like a mixture between bad eggs and sewers for weeks every time you got your hair wet I had the problem with, esp.  as my OH is VERY, VERY sensitive to smells--he even finds scented candles so overpowering that I can only have them when he is working away!

Going to pop in to my local hairdressers as well and see what colours they could do too and then decide.

Thanks for all your help and input, girls

My boyfriend loathes the smell and can smell it when I can't, but I wash it a couple of times and the smell goes. After that, sometimes it smells when it's wet for a little while after, but it's faint and only when it's wet.