Maintaining a low and beautiful haircut can take a lot of time and a lot of money. Even if you don’t have any significant financial problems, it’s perfectly understandable why you might want to save yourself some of the more unnecessary visits to the hairdresser – either to save some cash or the long trip.
However, figuring out how to cut your own hair women can often find stressful and too risky. After all, one wrong move can make all the difference between having an excellent haircut and ruining your hair to a point where it will be hard to fix.
So, how to cut your own hair? Here are our full guidelines for women.
The preparation
The first step of knowing how to cut hair at home is to make certain that you’re well prepared. You should get all the items you’re going to need before you start, and you’ll also have to carefully prep your hair.
- Decide on a haircut style ahead of time. Long hair can be done in a lot of different styles, many of which require different preparations. It’s quite risky to try and figure things out on the go so it’s best to know exactly what you’re going for ahead of time and knowing every step you’re going to have to take.
- Wash your hair. Or not? As we said, different hairstyles require different preparation. In most cases, it’s best to have a damp, recently washed hair, but certain hairstyles are better achieved on dry hair. Damp hair allows for easier and more precise cutting where dry hair allows you to see how your haircut will look like while you’re still cutting it.
- Comb your hair diligently. Another vital step for cutting your own hair women shouldn’t forget is combing your hair diligently. Whether damp or dry, your hair needs to be completely devoid of any entanglements as they can very easily ruin the whole adventure.
- Dry your hair with a towel. If you’ve washed your hair, it’s still important to towel-dry it. The standard easy way to cut your own hair involves damp hair but not soaking wet hair.
- Prepare your “hair cutting station”. Last but not least, it’s important to get everything you’re going to need in front of you before you start. You’ll need a couple of mirrors, a large one and a smaller one for your back. Having a multi-sided mirror can be very useful as well. After that, you’ll also obviously need style scissors, clippers, a nice comb or two, a couple of towels, and, maybe, hair bands.
Cutting own hair as a woman
As we mentioned, there are lots of different ways to cut longer or medium-length hair. We can’t possibly list and explain all of them in one quick article, but here are several of the most popular methods to give you an idea of how you can cut your own hair in a quick and easy manner at home.
Cutting a low ponytail
This is a very popular method. Here are the main steps:
- Start with damp hair. You can either get it damp by spritzing it with water or by having washed it recently and towel-dried it.
- Part your hair in the middle. Of course, make sure that it’s properly combed first.
- Pull your hair behind you in a low ponytail. Use a second mirror if you need to. Put a ponytail holder at the nape of your neck.
- Put a second ponytail holder just above the line where you want to cut your hair.
- Carefully pick the ponytail up without loosening it and cut the excess hair below the second ponytail holder.
- Remove the ponytail holders, shake your hair, evaluate the results, and cut some excess hairs if need be.
Cutting a high ponytail
A similar method can be done in front of your face as well.
- Again, start with a clean and damp set of hair.
- Bend over at the waist and let your hair fall in front of you.
- Comp your hair diligently for its entire length.
- Tie up your hair in a ponytail near the center and the top of your head with an elastic band.
- Place a second elastic band further down your hair where you intend to cut it.
- Cut your hair near the second ponytail holder.
- Release your hair and brush it down. If the edges look blunt or uneven, repeat the process and even things out.
The twist method
If you want an inverted bob, this method is for you.
- Lift your hair above your head and thoroughly comb it to the very top.
- Lightly twist the end of your hair between your index and middle fingers.
- Cut off as much hair as you want above the twist.
- Let your hair fall down and comb it again.
- Lift your hair again and twist it in the opposite direction.
- Cut off any straggling hairs that we left after the first cut.
The pixie cut
For longer fringe or for bangs, a variation of the twist method can work very well.
- Pick up a portion of your hair at the front.
- Comb it carefully and then twist it at the end.
- Cut the hair above the twist as much as you want.
- Comb down your hair.
- Take a thin vertical row of your hanging and combed hair and cut vertically up.
- Repeat for the rest of your hair.
Cutting pigtails
For pigtails, you want clean but dry hair.
- Part your hair perfectly in the middle.
- Separate your hair in two low pigtails on the sides.
- Tighten up the pigtails – grab each of them and divide the hair below the elastic bands. Grab a half of each pigtail (a quarter of your hair) with each hand and pull them in opposite directions. This will tighten the elastic band and move it upwards.
- When you’ve reached the desired length cut below the elastic bands.
- Polish the cuts by trimming the uneven ends of the pigtails.
