black woman with mismatched hair
(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)

L’oreal is trying to change the hair game by introducing a new app that will change the way we colour hair.

Instead of going to a salon and desperately scrambling for a magazine that has the haircut you want, or taking a screenshot on your phone of your fave celebrity cut that you hope will look the same on you, the beauty brand has given us an app.

The L’Oréal Professionnel’s Style My Hair app is an ‘augmented reality makeover experience’ and allows you to try out different hair colours and styles before you make the big (or small) chop.

But there’s a major flaw.

Not only are the styles limited, they only offer one type of hair – caucasian.

The app lets you take your own picture and choose the colour or style that may suit you, but the style section of the app and website offers only one type of hair.

black woman with mismatched hair
(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)
(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)

Although you can take a selfie on the app and play around with it, on the website also gives you the options of using one of three models; an Asian, black, or a white woman.

But the styles are particularly mismatched on the black and Asian woman, in terms of texture, colour, and even size.

The cosmetics brand worked with Canadian AR firm ModiFace which has become the go-to provider of augmented reality.

The AR technology uses advanced and realistic 3D hair and face simulation, picking up each strand to create an authentic experience.

So if it is such a refined process, why didn’t the creators consider that women were going to use the app or website who didn’t necessarily have a white complexion and would want their hair to look more natural, even if only on an app?

(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)

If the purpose is to show you what you could look like, why is it that you can only look like someone with caucasian hair?

What’s more is that the simulation device offers 56 different styles, with different lengths, style, fringes, but none that cater to afro hair, for example (with the exception of one in the app, but not on the website), nor darker, sleeker hair as is common for Asian hair types.

The colour segment of the app is a little better, as it recognises different hair textures and styles and allows you to choose from ten different colours (eight on the website).

But the ‘look’ (style) section on both the app and website is not very inclusive.

Although all the hairstyles are dated and don’t necessarily suit any of the models, the white-looking model had the most compatibility.

(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)
(Picture: L’oreal Professionnel Paris)

Once you’ve selected the hair colour and style (that’s if you happen to like one), you can store the data and send it to one of the L’oreal salons for colourists to analyse.

Reviewers have said it’s just another marketing tool for the brand to get more customers.

One reviewer on Apple’s app store said: ‘It’s just another advertising tool to try to get you to book an appointment at one of their salons. There was no facility to upload your photo to ‘try on’ hairstyles. I deleted the app within minutes’.

Another wrote: ‘Can’t even get a proper pic to fit from phone- styles are very limited – waste of time’ while someone else noted: ‘No black hair colour, just shades of brown’,

Metro.co.uk have contacted L’oreal Professionnel Paris for comment.

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