By Aqil Javed
We give you the fool-proof guide to growing/maintaining your beard at home. Whether you’re new to the beard game and growing facial hair for the first time or you’ve been doing it for years, everyone loves to change up their style. Beards are natural contouring for men and can make or break your look!
Planning and Patience
It’s important to think about what style of beard suits your face shape. The general rule of thumb is to pull everything to the center in an oval shape. If you have a long face then ideally you don’t want a long thin beard and you could plan for fuller sides with less/nothing under your chin. However, for a more square/wide face, trimmed upsides with it longer on the chin can be more suitable. Also, the biggest obstacle when growing a beard is being patient enough and giving it time to grow… Yes, you may look a little scruffy in the meantime but think of the end goal and that all-important beautiful beard.
Exfoliate
Yes, we wash our faces every day but the beard area can sometimes get overlooked. That’s why when lining up your beard it’s key to exfoliate. Get out all the dry skin and impurities that can get lodged within facial hair. A good tip is to use a flannel soaked in hot water and press it into the area to open up those hair follicles. Whilst the skin is wet and warm go in with a gentle exfoliator e.g. the Kiehl’s Facial Fuel Energizing Face Scrub. Your skin is now prepped for the lining up process.
Beard lines
We don’t want to look lazy and unkempt so it’s important to take charge while your beard is growing out and maintaining the length and shape. If you have slightly long beard hairs then brush them all down in the same direction and then use a multi-purpose trimmer (with an adjustable gauge) to create the shape of the desired line on both your cheeks and your neck. A general rule of thumb is to start from the corner of your mouth and take it to the top of your ear. It’s always important to remember to trim any hairs falling over your top lip as this is one of the tell-tale signs of a well-kept beard.
Shave the unwanted areas
After you’ve symmetrically lined up your beard then use either a cut-throat razor or one of our editor favorites – the single blade on the back of a Gillette Fusion Proglide. With your desired blade of choice – shave away all the unwanted hair that you previously trimmed down. To help prevent nicks and cuts it is best to shave in the same direction as the hair growth. Once shaved, if you want to take down the length of the sides then at this point it is best to trim your beard with an adjustable beard trimmer. Remember you can always take more hair off later but you can’t put hair back!
The all-important aftercare
If you’ve made it this far without shaving your whole beard off then well done! The final and crucial step is looking after your beard. Once you’ve shaved your face it’s very important to moisturise. Your skin has been through a transformation so make sure you use a moisturiser for the now bare skin and a beard cream/oil for the facial hair. Beard oils are better suited to those with longer facial hear and a pomade/cream can be used for shorter hair. A good complete beard kit is the Jack Black Beard Grooming Kit that contains a Beard Wash, Conditioning Shave Gel, Beard Oil and a Beard Brush.
