

If you got a Handlebar mustache to try out popular hipster culture, shave it off unless it really works for your face. If your mustache is a John Waters pencil, erase it. Mustaches are an all-season facial hair, but they are hit or miss. If your beard has a name and talks back to you or you play with it excessively and put beads in it, shave it off. If your nickname is “Beard Pete,” then perhaps shaving the beard will ruin your reputation, but it could also be the birth of “Beardless Pete” or even just “Pete.” Do you have a cold chin and face? Do you like storing food in your beard or making jokes about it? If you are frequently compared to Jesus and/or a homeless person, decide if you like that image. If you are unsure about your beard, ask yourself if you need any of these things. If you are not trying to achieve an endless summer by keeping your body hair, the following article is for you.īeards are good for looking burly, getting an image and keeping warm. If you are trying to stretch out summer, shave. Still don’t know what to do?įirst off, ask yourself if you’re preparing for winter or trying to drag out summer.

While fall has yet to bring in real cool chills of wind, the warm air of September is fleeting. Or perhaps you got empowered after you grew out your leg hair for your Birthright trip to Israel (because then it wouldn’t sting at all in the Dead Sea). Yes, it is still much too warm for that uncomfortable lumberjack mustache and beard combo you cultivated this summer in the forest doing research on endangered wolves, or on a boat pursuing a dream career of Alaskan fishing. Take it slow: Even if you do this once or twice a week, a simple slip of the hand can wreak havoc on your mustache, and might even require you to start from a bare face.Right about this time of year, Whitman students are getting into the shower (occasionally), looking in the bathroom mirror and thinking, “Should I shave now?”.This will give you the length needed at the ends to style it upwards with some wax. Consider leaving the ends longer: If you want to have a handlebar mustache-or even the slightest curl on the ends-then grow the outermost hair a bit longer than the inner stretch.You may need to tend to this edge cleanup a few times a week, too, to manage stubble as it sprouts. Clean up the perimeter: Use the detailing head or naked T-blade of any trimmer to help define clean lines around the perimeter of your mustache, including directly under the nose.For symmetry purposes, it’s best to work your way from the outside in towards the center, and then again from the opposite direction. You can then use your scissors or trimmer to steadily snip away at the hairs up until your desired mark. This gives you an idea of where you need to trim-like, everything that falls over the lip. Take out length: The easiest way to manage length is to comb all of the hairs down.

No trimmer? No problem: to help control the volume of your mustache, use a comb to lift the hairs and snip at them to a uniform length. After that, you can mind the finer details or any shorter trimmings around the perimeter. Take out bulk: The easiest way to do this uniformly is also to take a beard trimmer with a guard of your choice-memorize the ideal length that you keep your mustache.Then give it a few minutes to dry off-it’s important to have dry hair when trimming.

If the mustache is long enough, comb through it (with a fine-tooth comb) so that all of the hairs lay flat and come untangled. So, wash your face first (a normal facial cleanser will be sufficient), and then towel dry. Regardless of the kind of trimming you’ll do, you need to start with a freshly washed and dried canvas. Are you simply maintaining the ’stache you have now? Do you want to grow it fuller? Longer? Wider in certain parts? Is it still growing into your desired style, but it needs direction and styling? All of these things will dictate how you navigate through all of the other steps. How you approach trimming a mustache is determined by what you're after. Whether you're growing yours out for the first time or are simply maintaining what you've already got, we've got both the technique and the tools you’ll need to get the job done correctly. Careful maintenance of your mustache is not only the best way to keep it from growing into some walrus-like growth on your upper lip (unless that is, in fact, the goal)-it also helps achieve the type of mustache style you're after, since that might not be the one your face naturally grows on its own. A great 'stache must be trimmed, shaped, and coached into place.
#Clean shave or pedo stache how to
We put together a comprehensive guide for how to trim a mustache because they don't just grow out of nowhere.
