We have been grooming for a long time, and indeed we’ve been lucky enough to connect with a lot of people in the industry (as well as the odd designer of trimmers). One of the most popular things tweeted to us is asking if we have any advice on grooming. Most of the guys have just got their first trimmer, or are thinking about getting their first one and we thought the question deserved more than just a 144 character response.

We will be as useful as possible here, but it’s not like one grooming tactic that works great for one person will have the same effect on another. Everyone is different (which makes the world great!). We’ll give you guys as much information as we possibly can so that you can walk away and be confident that you are a lot more informed when it comes to beard grooming, but some of the information here is theoretical in nature.

Also, beginners in everything suffer from the same thing, LACK OF EXPERIENCE! Don’t be afraid to experiment a bit, even if conservatively. Just follow some instructions, but most of the time, what you feel is the right thing will be the right thing. Just take it easy through this guide.

Remember that a beard is there to compliment you in many ways. You may not even have a beard. You might have some stubble and are just looking for a way to groom it properly. Whatever you have chosen at this present time, it’s going to depend on a lot of things how you want to look. It’s not a cut and dry process (excuse the TERRIBLE pun) and can be a bit… out there.

We’re not going to pretend that this is a complete guide at all, but we’ve worked on it and are confident it’s one of the best grooming resources on the web. If you think we have left anything out, let us know! There’s nothing more valuable to a newbie than a veteran giving some sage counsel.

TIP 1: Grow The Beard

OK… We know that this sounds like a pretty stupid and obvious first tip, but it can genuinely be the most difficult part for a lot of dudes. A lot of guys find it difficult to grow a beard, and especially younger dudes in their late teens or early twenties. I wasn’t blessed with having really great hair growth when my beard started growing and this is just the fact for a lot of people.

Sometimes you just need to leave it grow. This can be itchy (or not – use beard balm)

Our friends at Beard Coach agree – JUST LET THEM GROW!

It may be a bit sparse looking, and might even look at bit messy, but if you have the option to at all, just grow it out for a few weeks. Cmon, just give it a few weeks. You don’t need to look like Zeus when you begin in order to have a good beard.

Here is Zeus. Look at how you don’t look like him.

When I shave a start a ‘new’ beard, it generally takes about 10 weeks to get to the fullness I like, and I rarely have a long beard. I’m just a slow grower. Let it grow at it’s own pace and trim lightly if you want to make it a bit tidier along the way.

Tip 2: The Intermediate Phase

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After, say, 4 weeks of growth, really take a close look at your beard. There are three MAJOR things you should be looking for:

1: What is the overall thickness of your beard like? It’s OK if it’s not that thick yet, but look at it with a critical eye. Is your facial hair really fast growing? Is it stiff? If that’s the case, you can probably grow any kind of beard you want. If the growth is a little slower and sparser, you can definitely still grow a beard, but may be a tad more limited in what will suit. We’ll come to this later.

2: Are there unsprouted hairs? This is when you can see the hair follicle (it will usually just look like a dark shaded dot on your face). If this is the case, try this article on beard growing creams, or try a vitamin like minoxidil to encourage the growth of the follicle.

3: Finally, check for all the bald spots. If there are a lot of bald spots take note of them and make an educated decision on whether they can be covered by further beard growth or whether they will limit the style of beard you can grow.

Tip 3: Appraisal

Based on the first two tips, you will now take into account how many beard styles you can potentially have, and how it fits in overall with your style and vibe.

A short beard, a long beard, whatever beard you want, can look completely different depending on your style. No matter what you want your vibe to be, it’s very VERY important that you take this into account when choosing which beard style you are going to wear.

Take this into account. Imagine you have black hair tied up in a ‘man-bun’, and a long black beard. Can you get that visualization? Well, imagine him in an ancient white Japanese style robe. Ok, that’s like a samurai.

Now, imagine the same style of hair and beard with a guy in a sharp blue suit, crisp white shirt buttoned up to the top and a dickie-bow. VERY different style, but same style of beard. IT MAKES A DIFFERENCE!

Now, I’m not going to say that any of you dudes want to be a samurai or anything, and that is a more extreme example, but, honestly, it matters. Take a while to consider it.

Tip 4: Talk to Someone in the Know

If you’re a newbie to growing a beard, there are literally LOADS of resources you can turn to in order to ask for advice.

Your Barber

An experienced and knowledgeable barber is a great thing to find. If you find a good one, hold onto him for dear life! He spends his life around hair, and will be able to give you very good advice on how you should scale your beard growing exploits.

Reddit

Do not underestimate the power of the internet. There are great subreddits that are used by beard enthusiasts. Here are a few of them:

These are just three that we visit here frequently. There are other, slightly more niche, subreddits such as /MajesticManes, /malehairadvice and /FierceFlow which, although are primarily based around hair rather than beards, are really great and active communities who I’m sure will give you advice on how you should groom your beard and particularly how it might suit your hairstyle.

Tip 5: Get The Gear

No amount of reading, asking and advice-seeking will help you if you don’t have the correct tools at your disposal that will enable you to properly groom your beard.

The amount of tools you need will obviously depend on what kind of beard you have, but without the best beard trimmer for you, your beard grooming and beard maintenance simply won’t be up to scratch.

We recommend the following as a basic:

We would also recommend some moustache wax, a travel mirror and a small bag to fit them all in.

This process is similar to the rest of the beard grooming adventure – experiment. You’re (probably) not going to find your favourite beard oil or beard wax ever the first time you buy one, but mix it up and you will see what you like. For example you might find that you prefer ones with coconut oil, argan oil, almond oil, jojoba oil and you need to experiment a while.. For example you might find that you prefer ones with coconut oil, argan oil, almond oil, jojoba oil and you need to experiment a while..

We’re not going to go into anything in great detail here as we cover them in these articles:

We recommend this great set of scissors also – how absolutely BADASS do these look! They also get the job done really well. We will eventually have an entire section dedicated to trimming scissors – bear with us. We only have six hands!

The writer of this article (me) is currently using these in my bag:

To conclude we hope you get some value out of this post on the beginner’s guide to shaping, sculpting, and grooming your beard.. We are very well aware that a lot of this is general, but we think we covered a lot of bases here and have you well on the way to being your natural, better groomed self.

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