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point of view GOING GREEN For Rebecca Gregory, organic color makes sense. Rebecca Gregory, Technical and Educational Director at Organic Color Systems, went organic when her allergies to traditional hair color products nearly derailed her career. 46 When Rebecca Gregory discovered that she was allergic to some of the chemicals in the hair color products she loved, she began exploring her options. "Organic Color Systems has been a good fit because they've lowered the dye levels and removed ammonia and other ingredients that seem to cause allergies," Gregory says. "Making the switch literally changed my business." So just how organic is organic color? Gregory estimates that 98 percent of the ingredients in Organic Color Systems products are either organic or naturally derived. Since the company hasn't found an organic pigment yet, they've lowered the dye load significantly. "Since we're using heat instead of ammonia to gently open the cuticle, the dye load doesn't have to be as heavy," Gregory explains. "We also use an element naturally derived from coconut to soften the cuticle and change the pH sufficiently to allow the hair to accept color." Skeptics have challenged the notion that you can create true blonde shades or cover grey with organic color, but Gregory isn't buying it. She points out that the company has a high-lift series that delivers incredible results. "We've added more energy and less pigment to our high-lift shades." Another plus? Te powder-based lightener does not contain ammonia so it's not considered an aggressive bleach. What's more, it has a pleasant rose fragrance. So what about grey coverage? "Since we carry less pigment in our NN series, we added more oil to soften the resistant cuticle," Gregory says. "We can also cover grey more naturally because we don't need as heavy a dye load." An unexpected windfall of switching to organic color was the fact that having 64 shades to play with—"I love customizing and blending shades to create new tones," she says—restored Gregory's passion for her craft. "I was in a rut, had become a paint-by-numbers kind of colorist," she says. "Frankly, hair color had become a bit boring." Not anymore. The Colorist | NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2013 | thecoloristmag.com PHOTO COURTESY OF REBECCA GREGORY natural woman