At Home DIY Hair Glaze

Hey! This is a legacy post – some products are sadly discontinued! You can find my (2019-present) hair glazing process can be found in this post! I also tone my highlights with this method; when this went live, I wasn’t highlighting yet!

(2014) I am very lucky in that my hair is pretty awesome on its own (LOL. Seven years later, it is not–thanks Tresemme, stress, and aging!). I wanted to make it unreasonably shiny without weighing it down with a lot of product (I am lazy). So, for me, for a friend, for you, and for science, I endeavored to guinea pig an at home DIY hair glaze treatment.

If you were planning on a salon hair gloss or glaze treatment (which costs $30 even at a beauty school’s student salon where I live!) for a wedding or just because, keep reading because learning is fun. This is a glaze/gloss-only treatment – no color means easily achievable without professional expertise!

Get it Together

Here’s what you need (most of which can be acquired at Sally Beauty):

At Home DIY Hair Glaze - What You NeedSupplies needed for an At Home DIY Hair Glaze
  • A Hairbrush – I have a classic 9-row Denman ($20) here, but I <3 the Wet Brush.
  • Clarifying Shampoo (2021 Update: Photo includes a Tresemme variety I used for this purpose, then. It was not problematic for my hair or scalp. Read labels and proceed with caution! Here’s one from Neutrogena for $4)
  • Clairol Professional Radiance Colorgloss in Clear Shine [[discontinued]]
  • Clairol Professional Radiance Color Infuser [[discontinued]]
  • Graduated Salon Mixer/Applicator bottle [[similar, $3]]
  • An awesome conditioner. Feria is discontinued, but Aussie Moist 3 Minute Miracle is cheap and FANTASTIC. You can get the small bottles for under $5 at drugstores/Target/Wal-Mart, or the link above is a *steal*.
  • Gloves – Nitrile, latex, vinyl, whatever. [[similar, $29 for 100. gloves are expensive in 2021 due to the pandemic]]
  • Two combs – you won’t want the teeth much closer than the black one pictured [[similar, $5]], and a wide tooth one [[similar, $4]]
  • Section Clips – will make your life a lot easier if you, like me, channel Cousin Itt [[not similar, but better. the ones pictured sucked, $6]]
  • An old shirt you don’t care much for

Prep

First things first – brush your hair out, then wash with your clarifying shampoo. Afterwards, use your normal daily conditioner, rinse, detangle if needed with a wide-tooth comb, and let it air dry. Do not apply any product to your hair – no mouse, heat protectant, nothin’. Just let it be. Here’s what my hair looks like after it is dry:

At Home DIY Hair Glaze

The Approach

If you have a friend that can help you reach the back sections of your hair, that would be awesome. If not, you can manage (it will just take longer). Brush your tresses out again. You need to start with completely tangle-free hair, or else you’re gonna have a bad time.

Throw on a t-shirt you don’t love as much as you probably should, gather your supplies and head somewhere with a mirror and sufficient lighting to see what you’re doing – for me, this was my bathroom, but if you have an awesome vanity that would work, too. In addition to the items shown below, be sure to get your gloves, section clips, and combs.

At Home DIY Hair Glaze

Gettin’ Mix-y With It

Grab your graduated mixing bottle, unscrew the cap. Now, you CAN add the entirety of what you need at once, but to ensure thorough mixing, I did it in two parts, so that’s what I’ll explain:

Pour one ounce of the Clear Colorgloss (half the bottle) into your graduated mixing bottle, then one ounce of your Color Infuser. You should be up to the two-ounce line, it will look like this:

DIY Hair Glaze Mixing

Now, violently shake it! But not like a polaroid picture, got it? Settle down, we’re just making our hair shiny.

Add the last ounce of the Colorgloss (the little bottle should be empty now), and another ounce of the Color Infuser. Shake again!

DIY Hair Glaze - Mixed SolutionDIY Hair Glaze

Mine appears to be just under 4 ounces because the product (from shaking) is on the side-walls and has not yet settled. It will, though, so don’t sweat it.

Application

From here, section your hair. If you’re already used to sectioning it to blow dry or style, do what you normally do. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, the nice folks on YouTube can definitely help you out.

With gloves on, apply the solution from your mid-lengths (below your ears) to ends, really concentrating on your ends (where most dullness occurs). Comb through each section to ensure even distribution of the product, then run through the section again starting the comb a little closer to your roots. This approach enables the hair closest to your scalp to get some attention from the product without overdoing it. Repeat this for each section.

If you have product left in the bottle after each section, go back and use the rest (unless your hair is short, then just discard what you don’t need); I actually squeezed it onto the “roots” of my comb and raked it through my hair this way. Once your hair is coated, comb through once more with the regular comb, clip it up, and let it be for up to 20 minutes.

Cautionary Tale

I actually wound up with some tangling during this (my hair does not like being handled with latex gloves, so I learned), so keep a wide-tooth comb handy to detangle as you go. Since my hair is so long, it took a while to get the product on and distributed the way I liked; once I was satisfied with how everything was coated I only waited about ten minutes.

Removal

Now, remove your gloves and rinse your hair. While you’re at it, rinse your wide-tooth comb, too. Do not be alarmed if your hair feels a bit tacky to the touch before rinsing, this is normal.

Gently squeeze excess moisture from your hair and generously apply your conditioner. Wait one minute then comb through it with your wide-tooth comb. Wait four minutes, then rinse.

Squeeze excess water from your hair again, then wrap it in a towel and ever-so-gently towel dry a bit, then air dry. If you REALLY want to, you can dry and style as normal, but if you want to really see the before-and-after, no-product-added difference, let it air dry like you did before you started playing mad scientist.

The Aftermath

While my hair was air-drying (so before it was fully dry), I could already notice a difference. Here’s what it looked like afterwards:

At Home DIY Hair Glaze

I really lament not having better lighting conditions to give you a better idea of the difference it made, but it was a massive change from my already-reasonably-shiny hair. My hair has no product in it, was not heat styled, and was just air dried and brushed.

Enjoy the shine for 6-8 weeks depending on your environment, haircare, and the conditions subject your hair to. Bear in mind that this IS a chemical process; my hair has not been damaged from this and the texture feels unaffected, but your results may vary if you have hair that has already been heavily processed by color, perms, etc.

Additionally, if you have hair that has been subjected to the aforementioned processes, you may need to process this DIY Hair Glaze treatment for a shorter amount of time (like 10-15 minutes). Beyond that, the Colorgloss bottle does claim that it is conditioning. I’m skeptical of this claim, and you should be too.

Comprehensive Costs

Assuming most people already have brushes, combs, and section clips (which really are optional but you’ll thank me), you can accomplish this process in about a half hour for under $15 for the first time, assuming you have a Sally Beauty membership.

You won’t need to repurchase conditioner, the bottle, or gloves (if you buy reusable or already have them) for a while, and the Color Infuser (I bought the 16 fl oz bottle) can be used for EIGHT applications ($0.50 per application!) before you’ll need to repurchase.

Use a thick, awesome conditioner two times weekly (if you don’t use it every day) to help maintain your hair’s new-found glossy awesomeness.

The Bottom Line

Finally, here’s a before-and-after side-by-side for you:

At Home DIY Hair Glaze Before and After

Whether this is a treatment you’re already paying for at the salon, if you’re curious about it but didn’t want to shell out, or if you’re like me and just wanted to do something nice for yourself, I hope I was able to help you with this at home DIY hair glaze tutorial.

15 thoughts on “At Home DIY Hair Glaze”

  1. This looks great! I’ve been uber lazy with my routine lately and my naturally curly hair is showing it… damn you frizz! I think I’ll be trying this out soon… thanks! :)

  2. This was really very helpful, thank you for all the time and effort you put into such a detailed explanation…I certainly don’t want to “just try things out and see what happens” when it comes to my hair! I think I’ll give it a go now :)

    • Wow. I’m sorry that you feel that way. This post was in no way meant to brag. Nothing on this site is.

      Any mention of the condition of my hair was only to give the reader an idea of what I’m working with. For example, someone with dry, curly locks might have a different experience with this product; I can only share my own experience.

      While my hair is (usually) cooperative, it really isn’t anything all that special.

      • That didn’t even deserve a reply. Your hair IS gorgeous. Someone is a hater!

        That being said, I stumbled upon this site looking for a color glaze. I have dark, super thick, tightly coiled hair. It is starting to get white in the front. I don’t want to spend $60 at the stylist. Do you have any advice on adding a little color to this to cover grays? Excellent post, thanks.

      • No, I’m not a hater. The first line of the post reads “I am very lucky in that my hair is pretty awesome on its own.” That set a boastful tone in my opinion.

      • You are entitled to your opinion, Lee – but that I was not bragging is a fact. :)

        It was simply an acknowledgement that I am thankful for my having much in the way of hair woes and that my hair is generally cooperative; I empathize with those who do have unruly or sassy hair and have to fight it to have it look presentable.

      • Hi Chi,

        I’m not terribly experienced with color. I know the line I purchased the color glaze from does have color-depositing varieties, but I think they’d be considered demi-permanent at best (which translates to not-long-lasting).

        My advice would be to head to a Sally Beauty if you have one nearby, ask the employee(s) on duty if they have cosmetology training. (Sally Beauty employees are not required to have had cosmetology training, but many hairdressers and nail techs take it up as a second job). If they do, you should be able to safely ask them for advice on covering greys.

  3. Thanks for this. I have unruly, frizzy, wavy hair that I have to spend a couple hours styling each time I wash it. It was about the length of your hair in those pictures before I got it trimmed yesterday – around 2″ due to all the dead ends from flat ironing it.

    In December, I went into the salon to get a glossing, but the stylist sort of scoffed and told me that it’s mainly for people who get their hair colored. They ended up convincing me to get a full color minus the gloss. I don’t know why I agreed. My hair was unprocessed at that point, I hadn’t dyed it in 8 years. They had to bleach it, and the color they attempted to dye my hair looked horribly orange in the sun. I just couldn’t tell HOW orange it was in the salon. Safe to say, they ruined me forever on dying my hair. I used a darker dye from Sally’s to cover it up, and now it has faded into a nice medium brown that wI’ll need to be touched up again.

    Yesterday, I used a cholesterol mask before washing my hair. Then I followed your glaze tutorial and OMG my hair has never been shinier, softer or more manageable!!! I wrote all of that above because I’m wondering how often you can do this? I’ll soon be needing to touch up my color as I wait for my hair to grow out (otherwise it looks orange) and plan to use the radiance dye. I just don’t want to damage my *finally* nice looking hair.

    Thanks!!!!

    • I’m sorry to hear about your salon woes, but I’m glad to hear you were able to get your hair back to a happy state. As far as the glaze goes, I only do it about every 9-12 months because that’s all I need. That said, because it is not a color-depositing formula, or a formula that alters the pigment or structure of your hair, I’d think 4-6x per year (so every 2-3 months) would be just fine if you feel it needs to be refreshed.

  4. Hi, thanks so much for your advice. I recently ordered this online to be delivered to UAE as i couldnt find a stockist. However the bottle is written in english and another language (i assume mexican), and it says the product is made in mexico. Just wanted to make sure it was the correct product, as i cant compare it to another here as i am not sure where to find it. It is same size and colour/design and it is called clairol radiance colorgloss, but the colour is called C/19 Clear shine.

  5. I did this treatment once recently and fell in love with it. But now, of course, the clairol products used here have been discontinued. Have you found anything else to substitute it?? I’m so sad!!

    • I had no idea it was discontinued until your comment! I tend to buy at least two applications’ worth at a time. The hunt is renewed! I’ll report back once I find something.

Comments are closed.