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 Henna for Hair

Henna: Lawsonia Inermis
How does henna dye your hair?
henna

 If you put henna paste on your hair, Lawsone molecules will migrate from the paste into your hair.

The Lawsone molecules are within the plants' cellulostic cell walls.   To make the Lawsone available, you have to dissolve those cellulose walls, while preserving those molecules.  The most efficient way to dissolve the cellulose cell walls, while preserving the Lawsone, is to soak them in a mildly acidic liquid for several hours.

Consider: if you have a nice crispy salad, and put vinegar on it, and forget to eat it until the next day, the lettuce is going to be disgusting sludge, and not crispy at all.  This is because the vinegar dissolved the cellulose.  You could also tun your crispy salad to sludge by boiling it.  If you boiled henna powder, you would destroy the cellulose, but you would also destroy the Lawsone and ruin the dye content.  If you want to know more about dye release and temperature, see: http://www.hennapage.com/henna/how/dyerelease.html

You cannot see the orange Lawsone molecules in the henna paste, because they are masked by chlorophyll. 

When Lawsone migrates from the henna paste into your hair, it saturates the cuticle and binds with the keratin molecules.  Lawsone molecules makes the keratin strands  stronger, and more resistant to dessication.

The longer you leave moist henna paste on your hair, the more Lawsone will migrate into your hair and saturate the cuticle. 

The more Lawsone your henna has to begin with, the more will be available to migrate into your hair.  Body art quality henna has much higher dye content than other henna.  If you use body art quality henna,  you have a better chance of getting a rich color and strong hair!
 
 Henna for Hair
Henna For Hair is devoted to the art and science
of dying hair with natural dyes. 
Natural hair dyes are good for your health,
and good for your planet!

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