Kelly Ripa is contemplating embracing her gray hair for the sake of convenience. During the Wednesday, April 24 episode of her morning talk show Live! With Kelly and Mark, the 53-year-old host explained that she’s seeking a break from the tiresome routine of salon visits for her blonde hair upkeep.
During the segment, the mom of three had a lively discussion with her cohost and husband, Mark Consuelos, weighing the pros and cons of the potential decision. “I got my hair colored last night, and I cannot tell you how long it takes now to cover my gray hair,” she told him. “It’s an endless… you came in last night like, ‘Are you done?” It takes hours and hours.’ And, I swear, this morning, I still see gray hair. My hair wants to be gray. It just wants to be gray.”
When her husband speculated that perhaps she’s not ready to go gray, she replied: “No, I would do it. I just don’t think, you know, you’ve seen my gray hair. It’s not like a gorgeous silver or a pretty white. It’s almost like, translucent. It’s almost translucent in its quality, which I think is weird. It’s almost like colorless hair.”
This isn’t the first time Ripa’s first time describing her grays as “translucent.” In a February 2020 interview with The Strategist, she described her natural hair color as “Anderson Cooper gray,” adding that “the roots are so white that they blend right into my scalp.”
Ripa’s consideration of going gray has been an ongoing discussion since she was quarantined during the coronavirus pandemic. The talk show host was equally candid on-air and social media. She often posted photos of her gray hair to her Instagram Story with the hashtag “#rootwatch.”
But that’s not to say she was entirely comfortable doing so. During a January 2022 episode of Live! With Kelly and Ryan in January of 2022, she told her former cohost: “During the early days of the pandemic, I had embraced my gray hair privately while publicly I was using brown eyeshadow to paint my roots some shade that wasn’t Santa Clause white.”
Besides brown eyeshadow, she also openly experimented with a root touch-up product, namely the L’Oréal Paris Magic Root Cover Up Concealer Spray. “Take it from me, this one is the best,” she told The Strategist in 2020. “The spray requires little effort, looks good, and is so fast: Spray it on the parts you need, and you’re done.”
She continued with a little extra tip: “You have to hold the spray in the right spot, and I zhuzh it a little bit afterward so that it doesn’t look like spray paint, but there are directions on the bottle that tell you how to use it. I use it all the time, for a lot of different events, and the light-to-medium blonde color matches my hair so well.”
