No to botched bangs.
If you’re bored out of your mind, you’ve come to the right place. The enhanced community quarantine is breeding ground for random hobbies and impulsive behavior. So, as much as we’d like to encourage you to switch up your look before the quarantine ends, we want to give you tips on how to avoid botched bangs.
Cutting your own bangs, especially with zero experience, will either a.) boost your self-esteem or b.) make you cry at 2 AM in front of the bathroom mirror. (No, we’re not speaking from personal experience). Before you start grabbing a pair of paper scissors, please read on to avoid the latter, okay? Now, listen carefully:
How to Cut Your Bangs
1. Gather your supplies
Move away from the kitchen scissors! Before you do anything rash, we suggest investing in the right supplies. What you’ll need are (1) a pair of shears or styling scissors and (2) a fine-tooth comb to really get even, solid bangs.
Tip: The sharper and smaller the blade, the less likely you’ll make a mistake. Even if you think your kitchen scissors or office shears are sharp enough, they’re still too dull compared to regular shears.
2. Make sure your hair is dry!
Here’s something important you need to know: do not wet your hair. Damp hair usually shrinks up when dry so if you’re cutting your bangs when wet, it’ll turn out shorter than you expected.
3. Make a Bang Triangle
For full bangs, here’s what to do: part your hair perfectly in the center. After you’ve parted your hair, feel the top of your head or turn sideways in front of the mirror. This will help you find the spot where your head starts to curve down, which will then indicate your bangs’ starting point. P.S. You can also move forward if you think your bangs will be too thick!
Using your comb, separate your bangs from the rest of your hair by making a triangle shape. If you’ve got extra clips lying around, use them to pin down the sides of your hair and away from the bangs.
5. Watch a YouTube tutorial
If you need visual aid alongside our step-by-step guide, you can always see how it’s done by watching a YouTube tutorial. The best thing about YouTube hair tutorials is that each video is tailored for specific hair textures, hairstyles, and face shapes.
For thin, straight-across bangs:
For thick, straight-across bangs:
For layered Korean bangs:
For curtain or Bardot bangs:
For curly bangs:
For side bangs:
Recap:
- Use proper supplies
- Don’t wet your hair
- Find a starting point for your bangs
- Make a triangle with your bangs
- Use online visuals for reference
How to Trim Your Bangs
We’ve got a secret: the best technique for bang-trimming is to cut into your bangs and not across them. If you’ve noticed hairstylists trimming your hair in a vertical direction, this technique is called point-cutting and it helps significantly.
Why? Point cutting texturizes and creates movement in the hair.
Follow these steps in Mallory Cornelison‘s tutorial and you’ve pretty much got it down!
I messed up. I look like Jim Carrey from Dumb and Dumber. What do I do?!
We’ve been there. The great thing about this is that no one will see you for weeks, so there’s time for your fringe to grow! Here’s a tutorial that helps immensely if you’ve cut your bangs too short:
One of the saving graces for too-short bangs is to style them accordingly, check this out:
How to Style Your Bangs
Now that you’ve finally achieved that fantastic fringe (or a botched bang), here are a few hairstyle tutorials that will help you elevate your look. You’ve got a lot of time to practice, so use these as reference.
For grown-out bangs:
For curly bangs (we’ve already listed one above, but here’s another variation!):
For vintage bangs:
For Korean bangs:
Got any more bangin’ hair tips for us? We hope this helped you out in some way. DM us on Instagram at @bookyapp if you’d like to read more beauty tips. We know that right now might seem uncertain—and believe us, uncertainty can be scary, but here’s one thing we know for sure: we’re here for you. Take care always! – The Booky Team