For the fashion conscious, hair dyeing is a great way to get a fresh look with each changing season. Whether you are adding lowlights for winter or highlights for summer, a highlighting cap is a great tool because it helps you place the dye uniformly over the top of your head. Although highlighting caps are relatively inexpensive to buy, they are also very easy to make yourself if you have a rain bonnet you don’t need anymore. Creating your own highlighting cap gives you the freedom to place the highlights wherever you want for a truly custom look.
Enlist a friend to help you with this project and place the rain bonnet on their head. In order to mark the cap, it will work best if it is placed on someone’s head so the plastic is stretched out properly.
Use a permanent marker to mark the locations where you want your highlights to appear. Traditionally, highlighting caps have highlights placed in neat, even rows down both sides of the cap. If you want smaller highlights, create smaller “x” marks that are placed close together. For larger, chunky highlights draw larger “x” marks that are spaced farther apart.
Use a ruler to help you align the highlight “x” marks to ensure they are placed in even rows. Make sure each line of highlights matches up correctly and that there is an even number of highlights on each side of the head.
Use a crochet hook or highlighting cap hook to poke out each hole marked on the cap. You can poke through the marks in the cap in advance, or you can poke through the plastic when you plan to complete the highlights.
Tip
When placing the highlights, make sure you consider how the hair would naturally be parted. If you tend to part your hair more to one side than the other, draw the highlight marks in accordingly. This is one of the benefits of making your own cap because you are able to place the highlights wherever you want.
Warning
If you have longer hair, it might be wise to try the foil method of highlighting your hair. While highlighting caps are very effective on short hair, it can be difficult and painful to pull longer hair through the marks in the cap. Pulling long hair through the marks in the cap can actually damage the hair.
References
Writer Bio
Elyse James began writing professionally in 2006 after deciding to pursue a career in journalism. She has written for "The Algonquin Times" as a general assignment reporter and published blogs and articles on Webcitybeat. James holds a Bachelor of Journalism from the University of Ottawa.