Happier Grey Podcast

In this episode I'm chatting to Helen Pengelly, who first considered going grey in her thirties, but decided she wasn't ready then. In the end she dyed her hair for another 20 years, before she decided that the time was right. Over the years she experimented with colouring to her natural dark brown, blond and even pink streaks. The curiosity got the better of her, and she decided to ditc...

In this episode I'm chatting with Jineen Marie Silvery who is the co-founder of the Silvering Sage App. She also has a facebook group, called Colour Me Silvery, designed to help women with their grey hair transition. Jineen's personal grey hair journey involved saving her long hair in support of her niece who had cancer. It's a transition that takes away all the colour, but as Jinne...

In this episode I'm chatting to Susannah Simmons who chose to ditch the dye in her early 40s. Like most of us, she had good and bad days during the grow out. Having experiments with lots of grow outs from long and short styles over the years helped give her some perspective this grow too. Susannah had her colours done over 20 years ago, and has found some changes in what suits her best now th...

In this episode I'm chatting with grey blending expert Karla Osborne, who is in the process of growing out her greys. She's in her early 40s and thinks it easier (and cheaper) to start the transition when you don't have too many greys, which is why she's doing her grow out now. Grey blending in a relatively new concept, that's rapidly gained in popularity over the last few...

In this episode I'm chatting to Victoria Wright, who didn't have any noticeable white hairs at the point where she decided to stop dyeing. For her the decision was driven by concerns about the impact of hair dye ingredients on women's hormones.  Like many women, her greys started coming in round the front, and she now has noticeable streaks. She's loving this stage of her life,...

In this episode I'm chatting to Sarah Faulkner, unlike most of my guests, her grow out was a lighter to darker transformation, as she had been dyeing her hair platinum blonde before her grow out. Sarah chose to ditch the dye, because she wanted to move away from her long, bleached blonde hair to a natural look that she would feel more comfortable with. It took a bit of adjusting to, but she n...

In this episode I'm chatting to Julie Kelly who chose to ditch the dye 10 years ago. Initially, her hair was still darker at the back, which she didn't love. Over time the back has lightened, to the more even shade she has today. She's also chosen to grow her hair, and embrace it's natural curls. Julie has to be one of the most active guests I've ever interviewed, having c...

In this episode I'm chatting to Sally Wilson, who decided to embrace her greys at 44. She started the process with grey blending, which gave her a much softer demarcation line for the rest of the two year grow out. Since going grey, she's started posting hair tips and hairstyling tutorials on Instagram. And she loves the sense of community she's found there, with others who are in t...

In this episode I'm chatting with Helen Hirsh Spence, who ditched the dye during Lockdown. She'd started to challenge her inner ageist before she started the grow out, and saw the transformation as a visible demonstration of her new mindset. Helen has done lots of things in her life, and in keen to continue to do so. In the past decade she became an age provocateur, advancing a new stage...

In this episode I'm chatting to Meg McKeen, who ditched dye at 40. She'd previously been dyeing it jet black, so she had the full skunk stripe during her grow out. Her grey hair transition coincided with a major period of change in her life, with a relationship break-up, her grandmother dying, the early stages her own business, and choosing to sell up and travel full time all happening a...

In this episode I'm chatting to Mia Maugé, who ditched the dye in 2016. She made the decision for a number of reasons, but I love that encouragement from her daughters was one of them. They had friends who were dyeing their hair platinum, and thought their mother would like great with it too. Mia started her Instagram page in 2020, because she was frustrated by the lack of representation of p...

In this episode I'm chatting to Sue Whitaker who originally started dyeing her hair whilst working in a corporate environment, after senior managers suggested she would be taken more seriously if she wore more make-up, switched her trousers for dresses, and had neater hair. Sue grew her colour out in Lockdown, and found them middle stages of her grow out the most challenging. Whilst her famil...

In this episode I'm chatting with Victoria Marie, who ended up going grey by chance in 2001, following a change of circumstance caused by the 9/11 New York attacks. Five years in the making, her film "Gray is the New Blonde" had it's red carpet premier in 2020. Then, just as she was gearing up for a nationwide US theatre tour, the COVID pandemic had other ideas.

In this episode I'm chatting with Minal Patel who is almost 5 months into her grow out. She considered grey blending, but decided it wasn't for her. Instead she's chosen to let her colour grow out naturally. So far, she's much more comfortable with the grow out than she expected to be. It took Minal quite a while to decide to go grey. Initially she had it it pencilled in for wh...

There are lots of different reasons why women choose to embrace their natural silvering hair, but this week's guest Jo Brianti's grow out was triggered by the realisation that she was trying to spin too many plates. When a dramatic incident brought things to a head. Initially, her new salt and pepper shade took some getting used to, and she wasn't sure she liked it. The colour has c...

In this episode I'm chatting with Alexis Eizinas, who used the insights from her career in beauty industry to launch make-up and haircare lines designed for Silver Sisters, under her Silvering brand. Alexis chose to ditch they dye during her pregnancy, and has never been tempted to colour again, because she thinks grey hair is amazing. At the time of recording, Alexis and her co-founder were...

In this episode I'm chatting to Emily Payne, who chose to grey because she thought her dyed brown hair looked a bit meh, and she was wanted a more distinctive and dramatic look. Emily has been a sex worker for over 20 years, so I couldn't resist asking her whether men found her less attractive now that she has grey hair. The answer was a definite no, if anything she's attracting you...

In this episode, I'm chatting to Alex Hughes, who went through her grey hair transition nine years ago. Rather than ditching the dye and going cold turkey, Alex just had her hair dyed in gradually lighter shades over 12 - 15 months. Until she was ready to stop colouring all together. She's finding more and more of her friends are getting curious, and starting to ask how she made the tran...

In this episode, I'm chatting to Catherine Chapman, who chose to go grey after a health scare with her liver. Her research into what caused the problem, suggested that colouring your hair is one of the worst things for your liver, which struggles to detox the hair dye from your body. Catherine was living in New Zealand during her grow out, where there is a much more relaxed approach towards l...

In this episode I'm chatting to Angie Newson, who has almost completed her grey hair grow out. She took a phased approach to ditching the dye, starting with the sides, followed by the back. She initially continued to dye the hair at her crown and along her parting. When she stopped dyeing that, she had her brunette shade lightened a couple of times to make the demarcation line look less obvio...

In this episode I'm chatting to Mel Barfield, who found her first white hair at 20. 21 years later she still only has a sprinkling of them, which she has no intention of covering with dye. While she'd love to say that setting a good example to her daughters, is the reason she chooses not to dye. She is honest with herself, recognising that laziness, and the dread of the ongoing maintenan...

In this episode I'm chatting to Silvina Neder, founder of the Silvina London, a haircare brand she developed following her grey hair transition. Prior to going grey Silvina had been using the Curly Girl Method, and after her transition she wanted to continue using haircare products with no parabens, no sulphates and no silicones. When she couldn't find a grey hair shampoo without them, s...

In this episode I'm chatting with cold water swimming enthusiast and author, Sara Barnes. She loves having her hair loose while she's swimming, photographing it swirling in the water, like mermaid hair. Sara and I have quite stripy hair, with some patches white and others our original dark blonde shade. Despite having less contrast than some, we were both very conscious of, and uncomfort...

In this episode, I'm chatting to Julie Kneafsey, AKA the Fiftyist, about her grey hair journey. And how the transition led to a new career, and a completely different attitude towards ageing. Julie's had breast cancer twice, and when genetic testing showed that it wasn't inherited genes that were responsible, she started to investigate other possible causes. That journey led to a pa...

In this episode I'm chatting to Emma Blaker who chose to go grey in Lockdown, and lightened her hair first to avoid a strong demarcation line during the grow out. Emma works as a mobile barber, and one of the things we chatted about was her male clients' attitudes to going grey. And whether any of them are colouring their hair to disguise their greys.