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Is there a way to add a little grayness to my dark brown beard? I want to let my beard get very long. I think a few gray hairs in my beard will make me look better as other posts have suggested.
DON'T DO IT, MAN! Nothing looks worse than long gray beard hairs, believe me. I have mine colored every three weeks and it takes at least 15 years off of my appearance. Plus, most dudes with gray beards seem to have a wirey problem with the beard hairs.
I will have to disagree, being someone with long, gray beard hairs (see picture). On the left is Pete, who I met in person on December 30. Look at all the long gray hairs in his beard. If you ask me it looks great. Taking 15 years off your appearance may or may not be desireable. For me, so far it's been preferable to look older than the way I do clean shaven. Growing a beard helps. Having gray whiskers helps even more.
Most dudes with gray beards have a wirey problem? How about revising that to "most dudes with beards have a wiry problem"? What difference does a wiry gray whisker make in a beard of wiry colored whiskers?
Hmmm. The gray does not show up well in the picture. Here's another shat shows it better but still not very well.
I have a large but short cropped goatee, which has a lot of white in it around the jaw line/under the mouth. Frankly, I wouldn't have it any other way. I think it adds something to the appearance. It isn't really a matter of looking older; it adds a certain definition to what otherwise, with a beard, might be a mass of whiskers, or in my case, a fuzzy velvet patch of blond/red hair.
The good news is that the original poster, if he goes ahead with it, won't really have to worry about roots and touch up. The only suggestion I would make is to have it done by a color professional and err on the side of too little rather than too much. You can always have more added later.
I agree with keeping the gray out. When any hair lacks pigment, it also lacks some of its natural biological moisture. This is why a short cropped gray beard looks ok, but a long one looks like an upside down afro. I also color my stache and goetee and it looks 100% better.
So what you're saying is that adding color helps to keep in the moisture? I hope not, because that's absurd. I will also disagree with your fundamental statement, that hair lacking pigment lacks some of its natural biological moisture. I can say this with a certain amount of confidence, since I have a significant amount of both pigmented and nonpigmented hairs, both in my scalp and beard. Not only that, I have a few hairs that alternate between pigmented and nonpigmented within the same hair. There's absolutely no difference in texture, moisture, or anything else besides color that I can discern with these hairs.
No, absolutely not. Of course coloring hair does not add moisture! A mixture of pigmented and gray hair can look great. There IS more moisure, albeit a tiny amount, in hair that is still active with its pigmentation. The reason that you may not notice, is because the small amount of oils secreted from your pigmented hairs contacts the gray ones, making for a smooth appearance. As hair gets longer though, things may need more help like from conditioners or hairdressings. Bottom line, do as you wish, but coloring hair and doing it right with conditioners can make you look better, man.
PS: I have a degree in dermatology
Not to be nitpicky, but now it sounds like you're suggesting that hair secretes oil. I don't think so. The oil is produced by the sebaceous glands which secrete the oil next to the hair. The pigment is in the core of the hair and is produced at the very base of the hair shaft at the root as far as I know (I admit to lacking in knowledge a bit here). I'm open to the possibility that hair color has some effect on this, but I cannot image what it would be.
I have two comments on this thread:
FIRST, I see no difference between my gray and dark BEARD hairs, when it comes to curliness, oiliness, or any other property. My beard is very stiff. My SCALP hair in contrast is very fine, and where the gray is getting more common, the hair is becoming less curly and more wavy. It doesn't feel any drier though. If anything, it feels more silky. I don't attribute the wavy change to anything related to the graying as much as to it just being another hair change in my life. When I was a child I had blond curly hair, then it became black and quite straight at about age six, then in my twenties it got very curly. Now in my fifties it is getting wavy on top and at the scruff of my neck (where it is very black, by the way), while elsewhere in the back it is extremely curly (curl diameter about 1/2 inch).
SECOND, having recently become a longhair, I can say that oils definitely are drawn down into the hair strands from up on the scalp. (I can't say whether the oils are thereafter secreted.) For years I washed my short hair every two days because my scalp itched after that. It would get really oily.
As my hair grew out, the ends (stuff more than six inches from the root) began to get very dry, brittle, and TANGLY. A longhair friend said I was washing my hair far too often. He suggested once a week, but after two days I began to itch, and then it occurred to me that, unlike my days with shorter hair, the itching now was limited to my FACE, where my hair is short! So I washed my beard and let my hair be.
It took about eight days for my scalp to get oily! And as those first few days went by, my hair's tangliness almost completely disappeared. My hair is now very soft, silky, and healthy. My comb slides right through it, when it would have fought many tangles before! So I believe very much that my hair acquired the oil that in my shorthaired days was left on my scalp to build up. And I must say those natural oils are far better than any conditioner I've found in a bottle!
This whole affair also tells another tale: Long hair is NATURAL! The scalp makes lots of oil to condition our long hair! No wonder shorthaired people have to wash their scalps frequently, to remove the oils that their hair cannot. After all, a hair can only absorb so much oil per inch, and once it is saturated, it will leave the continuing oil flow on the scalp to pool and fester.
Oh, and by the way, I had a trusted friend give my hair and scalp a "sniff test" after a whole week had gone by without shampooing it, and he said there was no odor whatsoever. :-)
So now I condition when I shampoo, but after the first couple of days, as the week wears on, I'm conditioning with scalp oil, which is not only the best conditioner on the market, but also it is free!
Bill,
A few years ago, when I first started growing my hair out, I tried an experiment where I didn't shampoo my hair for a whole year! What I did was every day to rinse the hair in hot water in the shower every day. This carried away excess oil and associated dirt. The scalp was very happy with it's natural protective oil, and so there was no itching, scaling, or dandruff. There was a slight natural hair odor, but not a very strong one. Dandruff is mainly caused by the scalp being irritated by shampoos washing away the natural protective oils, so we wash the dandruff away with more shampoo, and so the cycle continues...
I ended the experiment because the naturally oiled hair tended to be rather tangly, and to have rather little volume (my hair is fine, and at 54 years, not as thick as it once was although I am thankful to not have excess thinning at the crown). Shampoo and conditioner definitely makes it more silky and full looking. Your hair, on the other hand, is very naturally thick and full (from the curls)
Perhaps, after my hair has reached terminal length, I'll try the experiment again!
Pete (Pete_J)
Thanks for posting the excellent pictures. In both pictures and for both people, the long hair and beard looks great.
Victor,
Well, your new camera worked great! Hope your other photos
came out well, and I hope you enjoyed Maryland Thanks for putting me on the Web! I must have presented problems for your transfer function what with my jacket being black and my beard quite white, and me wearing a white shirt as well - I should have thought of the problem and worn something blue, say. Marge got a kick out of the pic
(she took it after all). I meant to give you the pics of myself I took in November, and so I will send them on by mail tomorrow. From the side, I look like a good double for Maharishi Mahesh Yogi!
(I just got back from Victoria last night. On the ferry ride back to Tsawassen, there was a fellow with a very interesting style I hadn't seen before - he had three long braids (to about 3 inches above the waist) coming out from the same spot at the back of his head (near the collar) and each was tied off with a different colored band).
Thanks for the complement - its especially appreciated from you!
It's true that the white beard makes me look older in some ways, although white beards on relatively young guys are not uncommon.
That's why I like to tie it up a lot since the long flowing white beard definitely looks older than one-inch tied-up version. On the other hand, my long ponytailed hair tend to make me look younger, so hopefully the net effect is fairly small!
Pete (Pete_J)
Be patient -- nature will take care of it, believe me.
Thanks for all the pictures, comments and suggestions. I appreciate hearing both the advantages and disadvantages of having gray hair in the beard or coloring beard hair.
I'll probably leave my beard the natural color and let the gray appear naturally.