Hair Thinning Scissors How To

Hair thinning scissors and comb
Photo: MsMaria/Shutterstock
Q: I recently purchased hair thinning scissors to use on my girls, trying to save myself some money, but I don't know exactly how to use them. All I want to do is thin their hair out occasionally because their hair is so long and way too thick. Could you tell me please how to do this?
 
A: You may not believe this but using thinning shears is so simple, that the biggest problem most people encounter is using them too much. The shears, when you look at them, have teeth as opposed to blades, and remove less hair with a single "snip". The purpose for this is to remove "bulk" from the hair without altering the hairstyle.
 
In the case of long, thick hair needing to be thinned, you will want to comb the hair smooth, then work in smaller sections. Slide the open shears into the long hair at a point somewhere between 1/3 of the way to 1/2 of the way along the length from the scalp. Make a single "snip" then open and remove the shears. Pass a comb through the section to slide away the hairs that have been cut. Move on to the next section and repeat until you've made your way around the head.
 
If needed, you can make a second pass in the hair, but this time make the "snips" at about 1/3 of the way above the ends of the hair. This will gently taper the fullness of the hair in the style. Always work in uniform passes. And only make additional thinning cuts when you're sure they're needed. If you remove too much hair, the ends will begin to appear stringy.
 
In addition, you only want to use the thinning shears at approximately every 3rd haircut/trimming. Doing so more often results in removing too much hair and you will end up with a stringy looking long hair style. After your initial thinning of the hair, you may also want to limit yourself to thinning only at the upper point on the head, since the hair previously cut during thinning, will now have reached the lower point (or somewhere near that point).
 
This technique is appropriate for straight or wavy hair. If the hair is curly, you may want to add a third pass into the thinning steps at a middle length. This prevents the overtly triangular look of many very curly long hair styles.
 
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See also:
 
How to thin hair out
 
What's a good number of teeth in one sided thinning shears?
 
How can I thin out the sides of my hair while keeping the length?
 
I thinned my hair too much. How can I make it thick again?
 
Texturizing the hair