What to wash a beard with, how often, and how to dry it
Why does bar soap leave a beard stiff?
The bar of soap by the basin is what most men wash a beard with, and of the usual options it is the worst. Use a mild cleanser made for facial skin, a beard wash or a gentle shampoo instead, and keep the soap for your hands. The reason is chemistry. Healthy skin sits slightly on the acid side, at a pH of roughly 5, while studies that measured bar soaps found most of them between 9 and 10, so every wash pushes the skin under the beard towards alkaline. The American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) puts it plainly: wash the face and beard with a gentle cleanser rather than soap, because a cleanser removes dirt without drying the skin, and dry skin beneath a beard is the common complaint. A beard also holds more than a smooth cheek does. Crumbs, sweat, city dust and yesterday's balm sit between the hairs, and the AAD warns that dirt, oil and dead skin cells left there can clog pores and irritate the skin. So the wash has two jobs: keep the hair soft, and get the skin clean without stripping it. Soap leaves the hair stiff and strips the skin harder than it needs. If soap is all you have on a trip, one wash will not ruin anything, as studies show healthy skin brings its own acidity back after a while. The trouble comes from doing it daily for months, when the cheeks under the hair start to feel tight and then flake.
A beard wash is a mild cleanser made for facial skin
A beard wash is, in practice, a mild cleanser sold for the face and the hair growing on it. Read the label for what the AAD asks of a face cleanser: gentle, suited to your skin type, and fragrance-free if your skin reacts easily. Head shampoo is the other everyday choice, and a mild one will do. Cleveland Clinic dermatologist Alok Vij suggests a good shampoo worked down to the skin to clear bacteria and dead cells, while the clinic also lists harsh soaps and shampoos among the causes of dry skin. Shampoos vary a lot: one review measured 123 of them at a pH between 3.5 and 9, although most sit far closer to skin than a bar of soap does. A shampoo built for a greasy scalp can be too strong for the cheeks, so if your beard feels like straw afterwards, switch. How often? The AAD and Cleveland Clinic dermatologists both say every day, together with the face. On a long beard, part the hair with your fingers, massage the lather down to the skin in small circles, and rinse well with lukewarm water. Barbers often find the evidence of a rushed wash when they comb out a dense beard: soft, clean ends on top, and a film of old balm with dry flakes at the roots under the chin, where the lather never reached. 044 Barbershop in Kyiv sells some care products, so during a beard trim you can ask the barber which kind of wash suits your skin and your length.
Pat the beard dry and keep the hairdryer on low heat
Drying matters as much as washing. The AAD advises patting the face dry with a clean towel, leaving the skin a little damp, and putting on beard oil or moisturiser straight away. Rubbing a beard back and forth with the towel roughs up the hair, and the academy lists towel rubbing among the habits that damage hair; press the towel into the beard and squeeze it out like a sponge instead. A hairdryer is fine on the lowest heat setting, kept moving and pointed downwards, the way the beard should lie. Reach for a wide-tooth comb once the hair has dried a little, since the AAD advises letting straight hair dry a bit before you comb it. Then look in the mirror and judge the shape. A wet beard looks longer and flatter than it is, and a hair that seems to need cutting often curls back into line once dry. That is why the barber usually dries a beard before the trimmer comes out. In winter, give the beard time to dry before you head out into the frost, since damp hair under a scarf stays cold and uncomfortable for a long while. Between washes the lines blur on their own, so to keep the shape, see the barber every one to two weeks. Come in for a beard trim and the barber can comb it out in front of you, show you whether the skin underneath is dry, and let you see how the hair falls after a proper wash.