Originally published 2019-01-23.
Going grey naturally means letting your own colour grow in instead of covering it with dye, and a growing number of women are choosing to do exactly that. One of the places that made the choice feel less lonely is Grombre, an Instagram community where women post photos of their silver, white and salt-and-pepper hair alongside the stories behind them.
The fifty portraits below come from that community. Some of the women found their first grey strand in primary school; others coloured for twenty-five years before stopping. They come from Thailand, Guatemala, Mexico, Europe and the United States, and their reasons range from saving money and protecting their curls to recovering from cancer or simply being tired of hiding.
Before the gallery, we look at how Grombre started, what actually turns hair grey and what the science says about stress. After it, you will find practical advice on handling the grow-out phase if you are thinking about trying it yourself. None of this is a rule: colouring your hair is just as valid a choice. The point of the collection is that grey can be a choice too, rather than something to be ashamed of.
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How Grombre Started
Grombre (a blend of “grey” and “ombré”) was created by Martha Truslow Smith, a graphic designer from North Carolina. She came up with the idea in 2016 while growing out her own early grey, after finding it surprisingly hard to locate photos of young or diverse women wearing natural grey hair. She wanted somewhere people could see what the transition really looks like and swap encouragement.
The account grew quickly. Positive News reported more than 46,000 followers in its early years, and by 2020 NewBeauty put the number above 171,000. Women send in a photo and a few lines about their experience, and the page reposts them with credit, so the feed reads like an ongoing conversation about ageing, beauty standards and self-acceptance.
The appeal makes sense when you consider how strong the habit of covering grey still is. One survey cited by Positive News found that 88 per cent of women try to hide grey hair as soon as it appears. A feed full of confident silver-haired women of every age quietly challenges that reflex.
Why Hair Turns Grey, and the Role of Stress
Hair has no grey or white pigment. Each hair gets its colour from melanin, made by pigment cells in the follicle that are replenished from a small pool of melanocyte stem cells. As that pool runs down, new hairs grow in with little or no melanin, and the clear strands look grey or white because of the way they reflect light.
The age at which this starts is largely inherited. Greying usually begins somewhere in a person’s twenties or thirties, and more than 60 per cent of Americans have some grey by 40. Dermatologists generally call it premature when it starts before about 20 in people of European descent, 25 in people of Asian descent and 30 in people of African descent. Very early greying can run in families, and it has also been linked with smoking and with low levels of vitamin B12, iron or other nutrients. If it appears suddenly or with other symptoms, it is worth asking a doctor to check.
What about stress? In 2020, a Harvard team led by Ya-Chieh Hsu reported in Nature that in mice, acute stress activates the sympathetic nerves around hair follicles. The nerves release noradrenaline, which makes the pigment stem cells fire off all at once until the reservoir is used up, and the hair that follows grows in white. It was a mouse study, so it does not prove the same thing happens in people, but it gave the old idea of “going grey from worry” a plausible biological mechanism.
Women Who Went Grey Early
She found her first grey hair at seven, in a family where both parents were grey for as long as she could remember. A boss’s comment about how much grey she had in her twenties pushed her into dyeing dark brown every two weeks until she was 41. At 42 she gave herself a year with no dye; it took three years of trimming to grow out, and she now models for stock photos, with her husband calling her his silver fox.
This woman has never coloured her white hair at all. For her, leaving it natural is about accepting who she is and setting her own beauty standards. She also points out a practical bonus that many curly-haired women mention: skipping chemical dye has been much kinder to her natural curls.
Having finished her transition, she noticed that her hair reads as white in winter light and greyer at other times. It is a small observation, but a true one: grey and white hair reflects its surroundings, so the colour can look different from one day to the next.
At twelve, a boy she liked pointed out a grey hair, and that small moment led to years of plucking and box dye. After four years of growing out the roots, she was 26 and fully grey, and says she would not change it. Her story shows how early comments from peers can shape how we feel about our hair for a long time.
Lhin, 37, from Thailand, has had grey hair since high school and once dyed it almost every month. Four years before posting, she stopped and let it grow, ignoring unkind remarks from neighbours. Today people ask which salon gave her the colour, and she encourages anyone struggling with the same choice to keep being themselves.
Grey since the age of thirteen and never dyed, she has also let her hair grow without a cut for five years. She lives on an organic farm and feels her natural hair suits that life. Instead of making her look older, she says, it earns compliments comparing her to an elf or a fairy-tale character.
Born with a mix of grey and black hair, she was teased as a child and began dyeing at 14. After her first son at 29 she left a white streak at the front, like Rogue from the X-Men, and eventually her stylist told her the rest had turned white too. Letting it all show felt, in her words, like finding “hardwood under the carpet”.
Posted around Mother’s Day, this photo celebrates the fact that her grey hair is a family inheritance from her mother. Genetics is the single biggest factor in when greying begins, so many women in the community share pictures with mothers, aunts and grandmothers.
Having dyed since 18, she was 42 and counting down to seeing her natural grey curls for the first time. For her the decision is summed up in a single word: freedom, from the schedule, the cost and the worry about roots.
Her caption is short and simple: stop covering up and there is more room to live. Many women in the group describe the change as less about colour and more about no longer feeling they have something to hide.
Marking two years of grey, she reflects on how easy it is to lose sight of progress when you focus on the awkward middle stage. Her advice, taking it one day at a time, applies to the grow-out and to most other long-term goals.
She dyed her hair for fun from 16, but once grey appeared, colouring stopped feeling playful and started to feel like concealment. About five years before posting she let it grow, and found her natural mix had the dimension and vibrancy she had been chasing with dye.
Ending Years of Root Touch-Ups
When a stranger said she was thinking of “letting it go”, this woman realised how much that phrase assumes grey hair means neglect. A year and a half into her own transition, she turned the idea around in a line that became popular in the community: “I’m not letting my hair go. I’m letting myself be.”
She describes going grey as a turning point that felt like getting to know herself again. The person was the same, she says, but the frame of mind was different.
Part of her motivation was a double standard: grey men are often called distinguished silver foxes, while grey women are simply called old. She felt that dyeing her hair kept that unfairness going, so she stopped, and says she will never return to colour.
For her the transition is as much inner as outer. Drawing on her faith, she sees growing older as a privilege and her silver as a crown, and believes confidence and self-acceptance matter more to beauty than any hair colour.
Someone once asked if she was her niece’s grandmother, which stung for a moment. Back home, her husband told her she looked like the best version of herself, a reminder that strangers’ assumptions rarely tell the whole story.
Nearly 47 and a redhead by choice for almost 25 years, she decided to let her silver grow in as part of what she sees as growing into a wise woman. Her hair had long been her vanity, so the change marked an emotional and spiritual shift as well as a visual one.
Taken at the end of summer 2018, this picture marks two and a half years into her transition. Two to three years is a common timeline for shoulder-length hair to grow out fully without a dramatic cut.
She admits that she and her hair, which she has nicknamed Sheba, still have a love-hate relationship some days. After greying early and dyeing for years, she stopped about four years before posting and now thinks of the silver as her trademark, even on mornings when the old urge returns.
From Guatemala City, she noticed grey at eleven and, at thirty, had not coloured in four years. Her mother and sister share exactly the same shade, another reminder of how strongly greying runs in families.
A decade after giving up dye, she writes to women in the middle of the process. She acknowledges that the transition can be messy and attract stares, and urges others to keep going because, in her view, freedom from age-based rules about appearance is worth it.
Grey since 23, she let it grow at 45. Strangers regularly ask who her colourist is, and she enjoys their surprise when she says it is natural, along with the money she has saved by no longer paying for colour.
She has had grey patches since 13 and estimates she dyed over fifty times in eight years. Now she leans into it, joking that she looks like Rogue from the X-Men, a comparison that comes up often for women with a bright front streak.
After cancer treatment five years earlier, her hair grew back grey. At first she dyed it every two weeks to forget, but she now sees the colour as a sign of survival and looks forward to it being fully silver. Changes in hair colour and texture after chemotherapy are common and often unpredictable.
Family, Health and Identity
She stopped dyeing at 33 and has never considered going back. As her skin tone changed, she felt artificial colour no longer suited her, and she likes that her hair makes her memorable.
After two and a half years, she declared her transition complete and happily showed off a wavy, untamed grey mane. Many women notice that their texture shifts slightly as grey grows in, sometimes becoming coarser or wavier.
Coming from a family with white hair, she started greying in her late teens and dyed on and off in her twenties. At thirty she cut most of the colour away with a short pixie, which made the switch easy, and approaching forty she moved to an undercut pixie that she loves.
She began going grey around twenty and, having been born without her left hand, was already used to being a little different. In her mid-thirties, people often refuse to believe her colour is natural. She also runs Stump Kitchen, a YouTube channel where she cooks with one hand.
Early grey runs through her grandmother’s side of the family, and her grandmother initially criticised her for giving up dye. Her grandmother later stopped colouring too, and one evening complimented her granddaughter’s hair. She was 33; her grandmother, with platinum-white hair, was 78.
She has had a silver patch since childhood and used to dye her dreadlocks black so they would look glossy. About six years before posting, a hairdresser asked why she was covering such great greys, so she stopped. When she cut her locs, her natural silver, which she nicknames her mojo, came through fully.
A 30-year-old from Mexico, she has had grey hair since she was five and loves it. Finding hundreds of women with the same experience online was, for her, the best part of the community.
Not every story is serious. She shares a funny downside of silver hair: a stray white strand tickling your back is almost impossible to find in the mirror. Light hair is hard to see against light skin and clothing, as many in the group cheerfully agree.
Her caption borrows a whimsical line from the writer C. JoyBell C. comparing grey hair to tears of joy from the moon. It reflects the playful, poetic way many members talk about their colour.
This was her second attempt. In 2015 she let her grey grow, then cut it short and covered it again with a plant-based dye when she felt unsure. Years of meditation, reading and time for herself later, she tried again, embracing both her natural colour and texture as part of a calmer state of mind.
A styling post rather than a story: bouncy curls finished with a bright pink lip. Silver hair pairs well with strong colour, which is why many women in the community experiment with bolder makeup and clothing after the transition.
Nine months after her last colour, a friend told her she was too vain to do the same. At 43, after more than twenty years of dye, she sees it the other way round: going grey is not giving up on appearance but caring about being herself.
Grey hair had been a hassle her whole adult life, and visible roots in photos embarrassed her. In summer 2017 she quit dye; it was hard at first, but the longer it grows, the happier she feels with the decision.
Light, Style and the Long Grow-Out
Many people thought she was mad to give up dye at 44, and some days she agreed. Her list of rewards is practical and personal: healthier hair, being able to wear it pulled back, and no more salon visits every four weeks.
Her caption is a confident one-liner about not worrying what others think. It captures the attitude many women describe reaching after the uncomfortable middle stage of a transition.
She stopped dyeing at 38 to celebrate the end of cancer treatment, around the time menopause began to speed up her greying. The slow first months made her self-conscious, but as the silver strengthened so did her confidence, and at 41 she loves it more than ever.
A year in, she wrote that friends had practically begged her to keep colouring. She may look older, she says, but she has rarely felt happier with herself. Her advice to anyone undecided is reassuring: try it, because you can always return to colour if you dislike it.
Bathroom mirrors and phone photos rarely show silver hair well. One day, in the right light, she finally saw the sparkle that strangers had been complimenting, and admitted they were right.
Her post is a reflection on change itself: why it scares us, and why hearing that you have changed is so often taken as criticism. She argues that growth, including visible changes, deserves pride rather than worry.
She notes how much the look depends on light; outdoors her hair shows its true colour. If you are considering going grey, it helps to check your roots in daylight rather than under bathroom bulbs.
To mark her birthday and a year of transition, she cut off the last coloured ends in a short new style. She had worn long hair for years and doubted short hair would suit her, but the process gave her a new kind of confidence.
This post features the member @young_and_gray29 and her styling ideas: waves, braids and side ponytails. It is a reminder that grey hair can be worn in as many ways as any other colour.
After twenty years of dye, she took a different route with her stylist, bleaching her ends to blend toward grey and keeping darker roots. It cost some length, but two years later she wished for more grey and had started wearing red lipstick every day. Her summary: “Not letting myself go. Letting myself become.”
She started greying in college and dyed dark brown from 2001 to 2015, worried that grey would make her look much older than her youthful-looking husband. At 35 she feels more confident than ever, gets regular compliments, and says her hair is the healthiest it has been.
She found her first grey at 14 despite being raised by two silver-haired parents, and spent the next decade dyeing. The dye brought more anxiety than confidence, so at 24 she joined the #grombre movement and invited others to share their own journeys with her.
If You Are Thinking About Going Grey
The women above used different strategies, and there is no single right one. The most common approaches are:
- Growing it out gradually. You stop colouring and trim the old ends every few weeks. It takes longest, often two or three years for longer hair, but keeps your length for a while.
- The big chop. A short cut removes most of the dyed hair at once, as several of these women did with pixie styles. It is quick and leaves a clean slate.
- Blending. A colourist lifts or lightens the dyed lengths, or adds highlights and lowlights, so the line between roots and old colour is softer. It reduces the stark “stripe” but usually costs some hair health and money up front.
A few other tips come up again and again. Look at your roots in daylight before deciding what you think of the colour. Grey hair can pick up a yellow tinge from hard water, sun or styling products, which many people counter with a violet-toned shampoo now and then. Because grey hair can feel drier, a gentle conditioner helps. And expect comments: some will be kind, some thoughtless, and many of the women here say the doubts faded once the transition was complete.
Above all, it is your hair. Grombre’s message is not that every woman must go grey, but that women should feel free to, at any age, without being told they have let themselves go.
Sources: Photos and stories shared by members of Grombre on Instagram; Positive News: Roots manoeuvre; NewBeauty: the Grombre movement; Harvard Stem Cell Institute: how stress causes grey hair; Wikipedia: Premature greying of hair; Wikipedia: Human hair color.
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