That old guy who told me to ditch the plastic guards...

Had a fella come in last Tuesday, must have been 70 years old, silver hair slicked back nice. He sat down and said he used to cut hair in the Navy back in the 60s. Told me he never used plastic guard combs, just freehanded everything with his clippers. I laughed it off at first but he kept talking about how you get a better feel for the head shape that way. So after he left, I grabbed a mannequin head and tried doing a fade without any guards, just the blade. Messed it up pretty bad honestly, but I felt something click halfway through... like I could actually sense the curve of the skull better. Made me wonder if any of you guys have tried moving away from guards for certain cuts, and if it actually helped you improve or just made a mess?

2 comments

2 Comments

tyler_white4223d ago

Hang on though, the Navy barbers back then didn't use modern clippers with blades like we have now. They used detachable blades on old Osters or Andises. So that old guy wasn't freehanding with a zero gap blade. He was swapping between different snap-on blade sizes. Totally different thing. I tried the same thing after hearing a similar story and just made a mess until I figured out the whole detachable blade system.

gonzalez.wesley23d agoTop Commenter

Wait, so the old guys weren't just that good at freehanding with a super thin blade? Huh. I always figured they had some crazy steady hand and the clippers were basically the same as what we have now, just older. But if they were swapping between different snap-on sizes the whole time, that actually explains a lot. I tried to copy a story my granddad told me about his Navy barber once and ended up with a total mess too, so your experience makes total sense now. I never even thought about the detachable blade system being the real trick behind it all. You totally changed my mind on this one, man.