Self haircut with salon style and precision

The basic cut - equal length

Hair stylists do all the time is to hold your hair between the index and middle fingers, and then shorten the hair in a straight flat cut.

We can do that in a precise manner with a "clip" cut out from plastic gift boxes. The height of the clips determine the lengths of hair. Stand the a clip about vertically on your head. Put a thin strand of hair between the clips and pull straight. Hold the clip with thumb and middle fingers. Use your index finger as the location finder and try to cut it. Pull out your index finger at the last minute when you cut. It is easier not to look at the mirror when you cut.

The principle is, if you repeat cutting all over your head, no matter how the clips are oriented, all your hair will be of the same length, perfectly, more precise than in the salons. Actually you don't need to cut precisely. Hair are forgiving.

This is the same principle as the Flowbee and the Robocut. But you got it for free. Hand cut is a bit slower than machines but I do it in a warm bath. Make sure you have a filter to collect the hair. For any reason, if you do not finish in one bath, finish it another day.

For long hairs like 6 inches to 1 foot, I cut a PVC pipe to the desirable length with a pipe cutter. Then I cut the pipe in half along the length. I use the half pipe to measure the hair length during cutting.

You can just tape two plastic rulers together like using the clips above.

Moist cut, wet cut or dry cut does not make much difference. But wet hair tends to stay together so you won't miss a hair or two. Also scissors cut straight into wet hair with no slipping.

Dry cut is safer in the sense that what you see is what you get for newbies. You may also want the final final cut when dry, after washing your hair clean and dry completely.

Layers

I think multi-layers mean that you partition your hair into different groups, and cut each group with the same style and length.

The length of cut determines the hair length, as measured from the hairlines. Just as important, it determines the thickness or volume of hair.

Women are perfectly fine with a one-layer cut, with all hair the same length - 6", 1' or longer. In this case you split the front into the sides. The back will gradually be longer than the sides. There's the natural uneven look with a tapered end at the back.

Men are fine with a one-layer cut, 1" to 4", but the hairlines need to be trimmed, unless they want to look like girls.

If you need different layers, one method is to partition your hair carefully with clips. But the equal length cutting method do not require carefully partitioning. The different layers will blend into each other naturally.

Women

Bling at the front can use the same basic cut to get the natural look. To control the bling thickness, choose a length longer than the desired bling length. After the basic cut, trim back the bling to the desired level with a flat straight cut.

The sides may need to be shorter if you want to have very long hair at the back. You may want to cut the lower back hair shorter than the rest. And you may want to give the end of your hair a straight flat cut instead of a tapered look.


Men

The top of your head need to be longer, so the "swirl center" at top of your head can be covered. 2" to 3" will be typical. About the same length on top of your head to give some margin to play around with blow drying or other styling if desirable.

The front hairline needs to be about 1.5" or shorter if you want it to stay up sideways without falling down like blings.

Too short your hair will becomes spiky, dependent on hair type.

A good choice for the back of your head and the sides is 1". Short is easy to manage. But any shorter will be difficult using our primitive tool. And because of the tolerance of your cut, very short hair may start to look uneven.

Now the apparently difficult part - the neckline. Actually, even if you have absolutely straight hair, you can do a business clean cut all by yourself. Now after the basic cut, all your hair at the neck hairline will be about, say, 1" dangling down.

I create a straight line guide by using a rubber band on my neck. I use a trimmer to cut away the hair below the rubber band. You need to look at your neck with two mirrors while cutting.

I picked this narrow head trimmer because it's cheap. Not really. You can trim off individual odd hair easily. If you make a mistake, it will be a minute mistake and nobody will notice.

You can use scissors and clippers. But for this trimmer you can touch your skin first, make sure the orientation is right and then move gradually to the cut point. Then move a few mm to cut the neighboring hair. In the mirror you always make mistakes unless you are experienced. One wrong scissor cut or clipper cut will ruin your hair style for weeks, until new hair grow back.

Now the most difficult part is apparently the ears. If you have curly hair you probably want to fully or partially cover your ears. If you have straight hair and want to cover your ears, you need to cut your hair with sufficient thickness on the sides.

Now if you want to show off your sexy ears, do a clean business cut, and you have absolutely straight hair, you have to read carefully. Not really.

You need help to hold down your ears so you can see where you are cutting in the mirror. A rubber band will do nicely.

Now comb your hair around your ears in all possible directions towards the ears, and trim off excess using the ear lines as a guide.

Then comb normally and trim the hair around the ears that is out of place. Since hair do not grow on the bones just around the ears, you can use that as a guide instead of the ear lines.

Finally, the hairline at the two sides near your ears need to be further trimmed. You trim it until it's neat and no odd hair stand out. This is the only places that you need to worry if the left and right are symmetrical. But seldom anyone look at you straight from the back within two feet.

For the sideburns, I use a clipper and pick a guide that gives me a few mm of hair, and blend in with the hair above. Then use the clipper directly to cut a straight edge. You can also use your fingers as short clips and cut. You can use razor for a straight edge.

Clippers are supposed to give you fixed length hair, the same as the basic cut using clips. However, in the basic cut you pull you hair straight and therefore more precise. Clippers also cannot do long hairs such as 1".

That's all there is to it. Start long. If you don't like it you can try again tomorrow. If you cut too short you have to wait a few weeks.

Hair car for men and kids

In case you do not know, you always need conditioner. Two in one is not good, not good enough to detangle kid's hair. After shampoo and rinse, apply conditioner quickly like shampoo. You hair should be slippery all over. Then rinse thoroughly. It takes about an additional minute. But even the cheapest conditioner will make a lot of difference to your hair.

You may need some non-fragrant hair gel to style or to cover your mistakes.  It can help your front hair to stay up and your spiky hair to stay down.  It can add style to cover up that your hair is not that evenly cut.