Mandy Moore Box Dyes Her Hair Blonde

Mandy Moore is freshening up her look for the summer months. The This Is Us actress recently revealed that she swapped out her brunette hair and went back to her roots with blonde locks — and rather than going to a celebrity stylist, she did the job by herself. Debuting the new look on Instagram Thursday, the new mom said she turned to box dye to lighten her hair to an almond blonde color.

The actress, who documented the process on her Instagram Story, showed off the new color in two separate posts. The first post was a before-and-after clip, with Moore sharing that “summer is right around the corner, and I decided to switch up my look.” The actress said it is “so much fun to be blonde again, and I’m completely in love with my new hair already.” In a second post, Moore wrote, “back to blonde for summer.”

After donning brunette locks for years now, Moore said that “with this new chapter of my life, it just felt like the right time for a hair change.” Along with recently becoming a mom of one, the actress is prepping for another major life change: the end of This Is Us. It was announced earlier in May that the beloved NBC drama will be ending after Season 6, and as that journey comes to an end, Moore was ready for other changes in her life. Moore also credited the end of pandemic-related restrictions for this being the right time to change up her hair.

“I’ve been longing for some much-needed change,” she told PEOPLE. “It really felt like now was the perfect time to do something different, with the world seemingly opening back up again… normal feels like it’s really right around the corner.”

To achieve the dramatic transformation, the actress turned to Garnier Nutrisse hair products, opting for the Almond Crème dye, as she “was starting with a bit of a darker base this go around, so I was careful not to go too light because I didn’t want it to turn brassy.” While Moore dyed her hair herself, she said she got a few tips from her celebrity hairstylist Nikki Lee. Now, Moore says, her hair “feels so much softer…it’s buoyant and bouncy and glossy and shiny and all the things I wanted.” She added that “the color feels indicative of how exciting and hopeful people are.”