Through the Barber’s eye: Josh’s Haircut by BarberBruce

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All to often the stories on this site tend to be in the customer’s view and never in the view of the barber. Today I have decided to share my experience of cutting hair with you in my series called "through the barber’s eyes’.

Saturday morning. Arguably the busiest and most enjoyable time to work. My shop fills up with an influx of boys young and old all wanting their hair to be given some attention. I cut so many heads of hair a day so it would be impossible for me to share each and everyone one with you but instead I will share with you the one that I enjoyed cutting the most.

"Next" I called as I was ready for my next client. From the waiting area up rose a boy with long brown hair which, evidently, hadn’t been cut in months.
"Morning young man" I said as I greeted him.
The boy looked as though he was somewhere in the region of 15 to 17 and he sported a pretty thick and long mop of brown hair. As he sat down I wrapped my cape around him asked him what he would like done.

"So what can I do for you?" I asked
"Something shirted please.." replied the boy

I love it when clients say this as I love helping them choose shorter new hairstyles.

His current hairstyle looked ok there was no doubting that but It looked to relaxed and untidy. The sides were left to grow naturally and there were no neat lines and the sideburns were just all messy. He had a bang that, when I combed down, reached to his nose and was really in need of a good shearing. We settled on trying out a shorter variation of his current haircut.

Before I began to cut the boys hair I introduced myself and he replied saying that he was called Josh so I will refer to him by this name from now on.

So where do I begin I pondered as I analysed Josh’s brown head of hair. It seems fitting to begin getting the sides trimmed down and neatening them up. I whipped out the old Wahl clippers and plugged them in.
"Ready, Josh?" I asked
"Head forward please"

He tilted his head forward and I then placed the metal blade on the back of his neck. I did the all important ‘doublecheck’ to make sure the correct clipper guard was attached and yep grade 4 was correct before beginning to remove young Josh’s hair. The clippers removed huge hunks of the thick brown hair as they ran their way through the hair. This is when I sometimes feel nervous because if he thinks it’s too short there’s no going back! I continued my way around the sides of Josh’s head approaching the sideburns which, they to, were cut nice and short. A mere five minutes later the sides were complete. My trusty clippers had removed the thick and unfashionable hair and replaced it with neater, shorter sides. Next the top. Man it was pretty long and that bang was needing some serious length taken off. A quick spray over with some water and a quick comb out showed the real extent of what needed cutting.

I proceeded to thin out his fringe and cut some length off so the bang was no longer to his nose but only down to his eye lashes. Much better! I then had to cut the top to remove the bulk and some length. For the next part the clipper was needed again. Josh’s style involved shorter sides and a longer top so the different lengths required blending together I shaved the clippers over a comb to achieve a gradual change in length until the hair looked natural and the top didn’t look to heavily and thick. To complete the look we’re the all important sideburns and neckline.

I used the guarless clippers to trim the sideburns into neat squares, Josh’s old style was so long that it had no clipper line defined sideburns and I cut his neckline into a square also. He then had the proper gentleman’s treatment using shaving foam and a razor to shave the sprouting neck and beard hairs smooth to the skin.

A quick brush down and job done! In 15 minutes Josh, the 16 year old brown haired boy had been transformed from a long haired boy with messy and scissor cut hair into and boy with smart and neat clipper cut hair. The sides blended perfectly with the top the bang didn’t restrict his vision and look to heavy the shortened bang was thinner so looked lighter and made Josh’s face look bigger!

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