“The only thing I do from time to time is a clear professional gloss treatment,” she says. She doesn’t use anything that deposits color because she doesn’t want to alter her hair’s natural copper tone. “I know what this reader is talking about because my red has definitely changed over the years,” says Los Angeles–based colorist Kayla Lister. If you don’t want to risk changing your natural tone, there are other options. If you like how the test strand looks, then you can use it on your whole head. If you’re more yellow-forward or blonde-leaning, she suggests the Aveda Color Renewal Color & Shine Treatment in Warm Blonde ($42), which goes on like a hair mask (there isn’t a matching shampoo or conditioner). “Strawberry blonde is such a range, and some of the color-depositing products are orange-forward, while some are more yellow-forward.” If your shade is more orange or coppery, Still recommends testing out the Davines Alchemic Copper Shampoo ($34) and Conditioner ($37). If you want to try them, “do a test strand from underneath,” says Still. Moral of the story? Treat color-depositing shampoos and conditioner as if they were dyes.

If you choose wrong, you could accidentally turn your hair pink or orange-or make it as dark as your sister’s. But the downside is that you have to select the right color to deposit. The upside of using a color-depositing shampoo or conditioner is that you can really enhance your strawberry blonde, giving the summer-faded shade some of its winter depth or brightening it so that it looks more like it did when you were a kid. But “they can still change your tone significantly,” says Still. They’re different from actual hair dye, which has chemicals to open up the hair cuticle, allowing the pigment molecules to move deeper into the strands.

Color-depositing products leave behind a layer of pigment that “sort of nestles into the cuticle of the hair,” says Genna Still, a hair colorist at Spoke & Weal in New York. I ask because there are two types of shampoos and conditioners you could use, those that deposit pigment and could potentially shift you away from your natural base color and those that don’t. But before we get into product recommendations, I have to ask one question: How natural of a redhead do you want to be? And that doesn’t matter! Because you don’t necessarily need to use a shampoo or conditioner designed for your shade to make it look less dull. Redheads may come in many varieties (as do most hair colors and textures), but the beauty industry tends to treat you all the same when they’re creating products-that is, if they make products for you at all.I’ve heard more than a few makeup artists complain about the lack of natural-looking eyebrow pencils for those with red hair.

Redken shades eq copper formula