Kelly Ripa considers ditching signature blond: ‘My hair wants to be gray’

Kelly Ripa revealed that she’s thinking of forgoing her blond hair and letting it evolve into her natural gray hair.

“I got my hair colored last night, and I cannot tell you how long it takes now to cover my gray hair,” Ripa told husband and co-host Mark Consuelos on Wednesday’s episode of “Live with Kelly and Mark.”

The longtime talk show host, 53, added that the process feels “endless,” and Consuelos, also 53, even checked in on her if she was “done” yet.

“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,” she admitted.

Consuelos chimed in and asked if she was “ready” to begin “letting the gray happen?”

“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,” she told him.

The Emmy winner has previously discussed her thoughts on going gray and revealed that she even tested it out during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“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 Claus white,” Ripa said in January 2022.

Ripa clarified that “certain people look great with gray hair,” but she was still at the time in her life where she “needs to dye my hair.”

Throughout the pandemic, Ripa posted frequent “root watch” Instagram Stories where she would show off her natural gray hairs in her scalp.

“I gotta tell you, I see you in the morning and I think it looks beautiful. I like it. I’m looking forward to when it’s just completely gray,” Consuelos told her in an April 2020 video.

Ripa jokingly replied that she’d probably look like that “by the end of the week.”

Perhaps celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow, Salma Hayek, Jennifer Aniston and more who have embraced the gray will inspire Ripa in 2024.