Tutorial: The One Minute Haircut You Can Do

I hate going to the hairdressers. I pretty much always have and can't understand how anyone would see a visit to a salon as a 'treat'. No offence to any stylists out there, but I seem to bring out the bitch in them, the second I walk through the door. I don't know why that is, it's completely unprovoked and unfounded, but it's been that way since I was a teen-so I avoid it by cutting and colouring my own hair. Lately my Mum has very kindly offered her 'services' keeping my hair trim, but this week I was home alone with a pair of scissors and in a flash of boredom/frustration I reverted back to my fail-proof 1 minute cut. Honestly anyone can do this, it's the simplest thing and works wonders. When I had much longer, bright pink hair, I'd always cut it myself like this.  So I've decided to put together a quick step-by-step guide for anyone that might be interested and here's the finished look below! Excuse the camera-phone images and the fact I'm makeup-less (in the other pics), but I was straight out of the shower and you'll still get the idea...

So as I said, my hair was still damp having just been washed. I'd been growing out my fringe (don't know why I insist on trying this because I always go back to it short) which was nose length and the rest of my hair was just below my shoulders. It's been feeling a little frazzled and wispy since my bleaching/change of colour, so was in desperate need of a cut.

Take a brush or comb and brush all of your hair forward into a ponytail on your forehead (right in the centre).

Take some scissors (I used my super sharp dressmaking scissors) and cut the whole ponytail straight off. Where you cut, is up to you, bearing in mind that the length of the 'stub' that's left is going to be your shortest length (which is basically your fringe if you're cutting it mega short). Personally I wanted quite a short fringe, so took it almost as short as I could-which left a stub of maybe 1 1/2".

The small 'lilac rat' may look small but actually that's probably about half my hair!

The cut works by your longest lengths being the hair on top of your head in the ponytail (which will be the underneath of your hair when taken out)-obviously because it's been brushed from the nape of your neck all the way forward to your forehead, whereas the front/fringe of your hair is already there. So take the ponytail out and it unravels by swirling around your head and you get this feathered cut with shorter lengths on top, graduating to longer lengths underneath. Amazing! Think of it as a more modern and less severe mullet if you will! Maybe not the best pic of it below when it's still wet and unstyled, but you can see the choppiness.

And that's you finished! As a side-note, you can cut it dry if you wish-I have done it that way before.  You can tidy up any parts of your fringe, for example you may wish for a less blunt fringe, so you could slice into it or perhaps you want to take it even shorter etc

As I said, it works on any length of hair. If you had really long hair and didn't want a fringe cut in, then keep the ponytail stub quite long and just work out what you'd like your absolute shortest length to be, say it's 7", then that's what your 'stub' length should be. I don't want to tempt fate, but I really feel you can't go wrong with this and that anyone could do it, it's really just that simple. You perhaps don't get the best idea of the cut as I tend to wear my hair curly all the time-but I managed to find this picture from years ago (below) which helps illustrate how it looks straighter and on longer hair. It's definitely rejuvenated my locks this time and the style is sitting much better now. Let me see before/after pics if you decide to give it a go yourself!