The Dos and Don’ts of Air Touch Highlighting

 Air Touch highlighting technique is quickly becoming one of my new favorites. Want the perfect blend? Absolutely. Flawless transition and built-in root shadow? Yes please. Baby-lights and tip-outs all with the help of your hair dryer? Whoop whoop! 

 Air Touch is a great way to create the perfect blend. Air Touch produces built-in dimension at the root of the hair while incorporating all ends/length of the hair. Instead of applying backcombing, teasy lights or weaving techniques, Air Touch uses a slice and then the air from your blow dryer.

Air Touch is the best way I have found to create baby light like dimension at the new growth while brightening all of the length/ends in one fell swoop. Air Touch gives the result of a tease, pushing the smaller hairs and internal layers away, leaving you all the length to color.

Here are some of my Dos and Don’ts when it comes to applying the Air Touch technique.

Do: Book enough time!

Air Touch takes time. Make sure that if you are new to Air Touch that you allow yourself the proper time to be successful. Personally, for me, I will add an hour or more to the service, depending on how much hair the client has, and how blonde they want to go. 

Don’t: under saturate the hair.

I find it best to lay some product onto my foil before laying the hair down. This will help saturate the back of the hair while you paint more product on top. Make sure to visualize where you want to see the product before applying it to the foil. This is most important on retouches, as you do not want to saturate already lifted hair. 

Do: use a balayage board.

I am a balayage board addict. It is one of my most used tools, and with Air Touch it’s my go-to. Using a balayage board will help hold everything in place, block the previous foils from the air stream giving you the best surface for painting. 

Don’t: take too thick of slices.

With Air Touch, you want to be able to reach the hairs up by the scalp in Zone One. If you take too large/thick of slices for your subsection, you will not only be too far from the scalp for that baby-light effect, but you will also risk uneven saturation, resulting in a slower lift or unwanted warmth.

Do: start the air flow from the scalp.

Make sure you are blowing with cool air, not hot, and a medium air flow. Pro tip: use a light weight clip (l personally love to use pincurl clips) to hold the previous foil in place.

Don’t: use a high volume on the hair line.

The hair on the sections around the nape and face are the most fragile and lift the quickest. I will use a 6 or 10 volume !1.9% or 3%) on the hairline of the client to protect from lifting too fast. 

Do: remix the bleach.

Because Air Touch requires a lot of detail, remix your bleach every 30 minutes or so. I like to up my developer strength by 5 vol each remix. 

Don’t: use too short of foils.

Air Touch is the ideal technique for clients with medium length hair or longer. Make sure to have long enough foils that you can lay the hair down, without “noodling” the hair back up. Twisting the hair up like pasta into a ball will cause uneven lift, and uneven saturation. Pro trip: This technique is ideal for Shag haircuts!

Do: use a lot of tension.

When you have your sliced subsection, you want to make sure you are holding the length of the hair with enough tension that only the smaller hairs and internal layers fall. If you are holding the hair too loosely, the air can push the longer hairs away.

I hope some of these tips have helped. This technique if practiced enough can become one of your favorites too! For more education follow me on instagram and check back in for classes!

xoxo - April