Why Your Barber Uses So Many Different Scissors?

Barber Hair Tools

With more tools used than average surgery, a haircut can be an intriguing experience.

Sometimes, cutting your hair may seem to be operated, at least in the sense that someone is separating from an extension of your body with a variety of extremely sharp metal objects.

It can be particularly disconcerting when your hairdresser continues to pull out all these different hair scissors and blades, but you can be sure that they all have a unique purpose that contributes to the fantastic haircut with which you leave the store.

To help you better understand what your barber is doing, here are the various hair scissors they could use, along with what each of them does.

Basic Barber Scissors

These are the most basic hair scissors used to cut hair and they look a bit like normal scissors that have evolved for several thousand generations.

There are several designs of handles that hairdressers can choose from, depending on their preferences; most are designed to put less pressure on the thumbs, arms and shoulders to help prevent carpal tunnel and tendonitis.

Whatever the design, the handles almost always have an additional finger rest, which gives the designer more control.

These shears also come with different types of blades, namely convex blades and blunt blades. Convex scissors have a curved edge, which promises a regular and precise cut, while scissors with rounded edges have a sloping edge more suitable for layered and conical haircuts.

The other difference between barber scissors and scissors in your kitchen is that they are extremely sharp, since they have to cut without bending the hair.

As such, these hear shears should be sharpened regularly. The advantage of this is that they can be used to provide a precision haircut (also known as almost all haircuts) or anything that requires a blunt line. 

In other words, your barber will definitely use them at some time during your haircut.

Barber Thinning Scissors

Also known as textured scissors, they are similar to normal hair scissors, except for the fact that one or both blades have teeth that remove only part of the hair, thinning them without necessarily changing the haircut. This can be especially useful when it comes to remarkably thick hair.

Barber Cleve McMillan told us earlier that thinning scissors also have other uses:

I know, these are not exactly the scissors, but they can serve a similar purpose. While barbers generally use razors to clean the back of their necks and straighten their temples, they can also use them to cut their hair.

Straight Razor

In my personal experience, it pulls the hair and it hurts a little, but it is worth the momentary pain, as straight razors can provide texture and movement to a normal haircut leaving uneven, rather than straight lines that produce normal scissors.

Learn more about scissors and barber tools. 

In simpler terms, similar to scissors cutting, straight razors can offer a hairstyle that looks more natural, rather than hard and sharp. As a result, they are often used towards the end of a haircut, once again, similar to thinning scissors.