Hair with Exaggerated Layers

Q: What do you call the cutting method where the sides of the hair are cut shorter in stages? The closer to the face, the shorter the hair is.

A: This is really just exaggerated layering combined with texturizing the hair with a razor, thinning shears or using a slicing method to thin the hair out. This kind of cut is relatively straight-forward, but should only be attempted when you’re an experienced stylist.

Look at this picture for example. It’s a simple shoulder-length layered cut. Her hair is cut in exaggerated layers, while the weight line of the cut hangs to the shoulders. Most emo hairstyles are cut according to the same principles, short at the crown while the rest of the hair is cut into exaggerated layers fused with extreme texturizing. In this picture, you can see the hair along her hairline is also thinned out and texturized so that it frames the face in a soft, wispy manner.

This is usually done by using a razor on the hair along the face or “slice cutting” the hair in this region. When you slice the hair, you literally close the blades of your salon scissors halfway and slice along the line of the hair. This gives you that sheer perfectly progressive layers and a wispy effect along the face.

The model’s fringe has also been thinned out and texturized, while sliced along the same weight-line of the outline of the haircut, to fuse seamlessly with the wispy sides of the style. Note how the cut literally frames her face with wispy tendrils. This has an extreme softening effect on the face. I’m a big fan of bangs like these because of the fact that it looks so attractive, softens the look and is much easier to manage and style.

After the cut is blow-dried, the stylist will usually take his/her thinning shears and thin out the hair some more to intensify that texturized, multi-dimensional look. Remember to NEVER use a razor on dry hair. This will result in severe split ends and a seriously unhappy customer.

The reason I say that this hairstyle is best left to the pros is that it looks deceptively simple, but can be disastrous. This kind of style won’t work on someone who has very coarse, dry or curly hair. The hair tends to become unmanageable and frizzy, which will mean that the client will have to blow-dry her hair every simple day.

Also, this level of razoring, thinning-out and texturizing can be dangerous. I’ve seen an unexperienced stylist hack away at the hair of a client until there was just a few limp pieces of length left. Extreme texturizing like this takes talent and experience. In short, this is really just intense layering around face with the use of a razor and thinning shears or using a slicing method.

This hairstyle was very popular in the 80s and 90s. Remember the Rachel Haircut of Jennifer Aniston at the height of the sitcom Friends? Her cut was longer than the one in the picture, but it was also texturized like this at the sides.

©Hairfinder.com

See also:

How to cut hair

Hair pointing and slithering

The good and the bad about razor cuts