Men's Haircut Styles — What to Ask Your Barber For
The cuts we do, what to ask for, and what each one looks like.
Walk-ins welcome · Mon–Sat 9–7, Sun 10–3 · (516) 328-0724
How to ask for a haircut and actually get it
Do not open with the name of a cut. "Fade", "taper" and "crop" mean measurably different things to different barbers, and a name is the one part of the request that can be misheard without anyone noticing until it is too short.
Open with the three facts that cannot be misread, in this order:
- How short at the shortest point. A guard number, a millimetre figure, or "skin". This is the only irreversible decision in the chair.
- How high the short part goes. Point at your own head with a finger. The top of your ear and the parietal ridge — the corner where the side of your head turns into the top, which you can find by laying a comb flat on top and seeing where it lifts off — are the two landmarks every barber uses. "Start it here" beats any word.
- How much comes off the top. In centimetres or in fingers held up, never in adjectives. "Leave two fingers on top" is unambiguous. "A bit off the top" is not.
Then add the four things barbers ask for and rarely get told:
- What you do to it at home. A cut for someone who blow-dries is a different cut from one for someone who towel-dries and walks out. If the honest answer is "nothing", say "nothing" — it changes how much weight gets left in.
- The last thing that went wrong. "Last time the sides ended up too high" is the single most useful sentence anyone says in this shop.
- Your neckline: square, rounded, or natural. Square holds a sharp edge for about ten days then grows into a visible block. Rounded suits a narrow nape. Natural grows out invisibly and is what you want if you stretch to six weeks. If you do not say, you get the barber's default.
- Your sideburns: square or rounded, and where they end. Level with the middle of the ear is the standard; level with the bottom of the ear is longer and reads older.
Before you get out of the chair, ask how many weeks it will hold. That number, not the photo, is what tells you whether the cut fits your life.
Fades
A fade is a gradient that runs from short at the bottom to longer at the top, and the words in front of it — low, mid, high, drop, burst, taper — describe only two variables: how high up the head the gradient starts, and how short the shortest point goes.
The one distinction worth learning before you sit down: a taper leaves visible hair at the baseline; a fade goes to skin. Run a finger up the back of your neck after a cut. If you can feel hair at the bottom edge, you had a taper. If you feel skin, you had a fade.
- low taper fade — the one that keeps length at the bottom. Holds 3–4 weeks.
- mid fade — the gradient starts between the ear and the temple. Holds 2–3 weeks.
- high skin fade — bare skin, starting at or above the ridge. Holds 1–2 weeks.
- burst fade — a semicircle around the ear, length kept at the nape. Holds 2–3 weeks.
- drop fade — the line dips behind the ear and follows the skull. Holds 2–3 weeks.
All five are booked as fade haircuts.
Crops and short cuts
Short does not mean simple: the two cuts below are the ones people most often try at home and most often bring back to a barber. Both are cut with the same tools as a fade and both live or die on the perimeter — the neckline and the hair around the ears.
- textured crop — short sides, hair worn forward into a fringe, top point-cut for separation. Holds 4–6 weeks.
- buzz cut — one length all over, or a longer top graded into shorter sides. Holds 2–4 weeks depending on the guard.
Both are booked as a men's haircut.
Classic and scissor work
A scissor cut removes length with shears and leaves the ends cut at an angle; a clipper cut removes length with a machine set to one length and leaves every end cut square. The visible difference is that scissor-cut hair falls in a shape and clipper-cut hair sits in a plane.
Scissor work is one of the four things Gali Khik, our NY State licensed Master Barber, has been doing here since 2005.
- classic scissor cut — no clippers, including the neckline. Holds 5–8 weeks, the longest interval in this guide.
Booked as a men's haircut.
Beards
A beard is shaped by two lines, not by its length: the cheek line and the neck line. Get those two wrong and no amount of trimming fixes it.
- beard styles — the shapes, which suits which face, and where the two lines go.
Booked as a beard trim.
Bring a photo — here's why that works
A reference photo removes the two things that go wrong in a haircut conversation: your idea of what a word means, and the barber's. It works best when you bring two photos — one of the shape you want, and one of someone whose hair is like yours.
Five things that make a reference photo useful rather than decorative:
- Bring a photo of the back. The front is where you notice a mistake; the back is where it happens, and it is the angle nobody screenshots.
- Say which part of the photo you mean. Most reference photos contain four or five separate decisions — fringe length, fade height, top length, part, neckline — and you probably only care about one of them. Name it.
- Match the hair type, not the face. A photo of straight hair shows a result curly hair cannot make wet, and a photo of thick hair shows a density fine hair does not have.
- Screenshot it before you arrive. Your phone goes in the cape pocket and the shop's signal is not your problem to solve in the chair.
- A photo of your own hair, from three weeks ago, when you liked it, beats any photo of a stranger. Take one next time you walk out happy.
What every one of these costs
Every cut on this page is a $30 men's haircut, except a beard shape at $15. A fade is not a separate service with its own price — it is a men's haircut, cut that way, so it is $30.
There is no surcharge on this page for asking for a named style; a burst fade costs what a straightforward short back and sides costs. The full list is on our barber shop prices page.
The cuts, one page each
Textured Crop
4–6 weeks, or 3–4 if the sides are faded
What is a textured crop, and how does it differ from a French crop?
Visit us in Franklin Square
Franklin Square, NY 11010
(516) 328-0724
- Monday – Saturday
- 9:00 AM – 7:00 PM
- Sunday
- 10:00 AM – 3:00 PM
Walk-ins are welcome during all opening hours, and appointments can be made by phone.
