Henna for Hair: Dye gray hair brunette shades with henna, indigo and walnut: safe, beautiful!

If you dye your hair with a mixture of henna and other plant dyes, such as walnut powder, indigo, clove, you can harmonize your graying hair with henna, and eventually cover even white hair. You may need to leave the pastes on your hair a longer time, wrapped for warmth, and use dye plants with the highest dye content to saturate your gray hair with color.

Walnut powder (made from the walnut husks), has juglone, a brown dye which will bind with keratin. Do not use walnut powder if you are allergic to walnuts!

Clove powder has eugenol, which will help the dyes go into solution, and a brownish tannin dye which will bind to keratin. However, clove can irritate some people's skin! Use clove sparingly.

Indigo has indigol, a dark blue dye, which will bind to keratin.

Rhubarb root has chrysophanic acid, a yellow dye, which will bind to keratin.

If you mix these dye plant powders and other safe dye plant powders with your henna, you can get the color you want! Harvest hair from your hairbrush, try things, experiment, and see what works for you!

Most of the dye molecules are larger than the Lawsone molecule, so tend to bind into the outermost layer of the hair shaft. If you find your hair is losing the darker rich color you want as shampoos go by, you're losing some of the larger molecules from the outermost layer. You can dye your hair frequently with these plant dyes to deepen and refresh the color.