Many of the most discriminating critics in the beauty industry refer to Wendy Bond for her expertise in hair color. This top colorist is widely recognized as a leading color educator for professional stylists. As the National Director of Education for Lakmé USA, Wendy travels extensively to teach the latest trends in color, corrective color, and color formulation. Her combination of technical excellence, artistic vision, and sensitivity to learning styles has made her one of the most in-demand teachers in the industry.
According to Wendy, for the cooler months ahead we’ll see the range of honey brown, beige, caramel, and sand enhances the warmth of long, flowing, and flawless hair. For fantasy color, she’s seeing more hints of fantasy color that’s glamorous and elegant, creating dimension without being visibly artificial.
“For a long time now, we’ve seen color moving away from the scalp and towards the mids (midshaft) and ends, like balayage and ombre,” said Wendy, addressing other professionals. “Consumers love the lower maintenance, and it’s a versatile look that can be soft or strong depending on the application. At Lakmé, we’ve been incorporating dimensional color panels with our single-process color. These panels are placed throughout the head off the scalp and can give shimmers and glimmers of intense and natural shades throughout. It can be customized depending on whether the client wants a lived in look or contemporary, edgy fashion shades.”
For mainstream clients, Wendy recommends Lakme’s Tiger’s Eye and Amazing Copper looks from their new Chroma Freedom Collection. She feels that the Tiger’s Eye look is an excellent way to introduce highlights to clients who have previously had color or have single-process color and want to create more dimension.
“The Amazing Copper look is the perfect way to create dimension on pre-existing color and virgin applications. This look grows out gracefully and shows that the ability to add dimension to a single process client gives them a unique look that cannot be duplicated with highlights or traditional color,” Wendy adds.
For more daring clients, Wendy feels that anything goes color-wise. However, this season many clients desire the ability to style their hair in different ways to make it appear shorter than it is. Their color choice and placement should consider this. Also on the daring side, fashion color combinations will carry over into the cooler months, but differently than we saw them over the summer. Wendy 
claims that the sophisticated client is moving into tone-on-tone fantasy color using variations of a similar color palette rather than going with a full head of a fashion color or an extreme rainbow.
When asked about color care, Wendy said, “Sulfate-free shampoos are always a good recommendation, but It’s also good to understand that clients should also check the pH levels of their shampoo. A lower pH prevents the cuticle from opening too much, preventing the color from fading. Lakmé Teknia Color Stay Shampoo has a low pH of 3. It’s also paraben free, PPD free, PEG free, mineral oil free, and vegan. It contains sunflower seed extract that protects color-treated hair from damage caused by UV radiation and the environment.”
She continued, “Some of my personal favorites include Lakmé’s Teknia Color Stay Shampoo, Conditioner, and Treatment and the Teknia Ultra line for maintaining color.”
In closing, Wendy was asked to name some of her favorite celebrity trendsetters for color, to which she answered, “Jessica Chastain’s hair is a beautiful warm honey rose color with a subtle shimmer that makes it stand out. Rosie Huntington-Whiteley’s blonde always looks natural and frames her face in all the right places. And then there’s Katy Perry. She is truly an inspirational trendsetter because she isn’t afraid to try a new color or style, whether it’s a vibrant fashion color or something like her currently short platinum blonde.”
Wendy Bond has been nominated four times for the North America Hairstyling Awards hair color category, once for avant-garde, and won for Master Stylist of the Year in 2010. Wendy’s work has been featured on television with The View and MTV’s Making The Band as well as in Mademoiselle, In Style, Jane, Marie Clare, Self, GQ, Details, YM, SoHo Style, Time Out, and Vogue magazines.
Wendy Bond
Lakmé USA - National Director of Education
