Hair Tweezing Tips

Introduction

I recently spent an entire day with the famous Sophia Stavron who is a Dallas based expert eye brow artist, skin care guru and celebrate body waxing star. Sophia, who is a licensed aesthetician performs her magic on clients at Sophia's Skin & Body Studio (972-754-5639) in Park Cities.

In her skin care studio Sophia uses tweezers every day. Specifically she utilizes them "in conjunction with body hair waxing, eyebrow shaping and for removal of random facial hair during treatments".

Sophia explained that using a tweezer to temporarily remove hair is known as "tweezing" and "not plucking". The old term "plucking is not considered politically correct in the world of skin care gurus and hair removal experts".

Tweezing Dangers

While they may seem completely safe, in reality tweezers can actually be dangerous to use by inexperienced users. According to Sophia "without awareness of how to manipulate these little instruments, consumers can and do inflict serious damage to their skin and hair follicles".

How does tweezing damage occur? According to Sophia "it can occur when the delicate blood vessels around the hair follicles are accidentally broken". She explained that "other problems can include, but are not limited to, skin scarping, tearing and even the potential for poking tiny holes in the skin.

Many states recognize the potential dangers in tweezing and thus they often require a cosmetologist or aesthetician's license to do hair removal like tweezing. If you do decide to have professional tweezing performed, make sure that you visit a state licensed pro like Sophia.

Pros Of Tweezing

Generally speaking tweezing is ideal for removing unwanted facial and small amounts of body hair.

It is also great for touch up shaping and maintenance of the eyebrows. Tweezers also work great for men and women who wish to groom their unibrow area.

With proper lighting tweezing can be done in the privacy of your own home and only requires a properly sterilized tweezer.

Another advantage of home tweezing is that it can be combined with other home spa treatments. For example, tweezing right after a long luxurious bath or shower will warm and soften the skin, making tweezing less painful and more efficient.

Cons Of Tweezing

Putting aside any potential injuries tweezing is not really practical for large areas of the body. It can also be a slow and sometimes painful process.

Repetitive tweezing can ultimately lead to the development of ingrown hairs and puckered skin. Although rare, Sophia commented that "infection from unsanitary tweezers could become an issue".

For some skin types tweezing can cause pigmentation discoloration. Luckily in most cases the discolored areas will eventually fade. To minimize pigmentation issues, be very careful to avoid nipping or tearing the skin. Slanted tweezers are best for this type of challenge

If you do accidentally nip and tear dab on Karin Herzog's Oxygen Body 3% Cream. This kills the bacteria, disinfects, calms down the skin (lessens redness) and hydrates. It will also help heal the skin to prevent pigmentation issue.

Ultimately hair that is tweezed may or may not grow back. As Sophia pointed out "regular tweezing may weaken the hair follicle in such a manner that the hair does not grow back". However, in some cases, Sophia stated that if the hair does grow back, just keep tweezing."

Easy Steps For Accurate Tweezing

After spending some time explaining the pros and cons of tweezing and hair removal options to me, Sophia provided the following helpful tips on tweezing.

Before beginning the tweezing activities disinfect the tips in rubbing alcohol.

Keep in mind that sometimes tweezing can be a little painful for people with sensitive skin or hair follicles. In some rare cases tweezing may cause a little bit of blood or general redness to the area that was tweezed.

1. Tweeze eyebrows at least one hour before applying any eyebrow makeup. 2. If you have sensitive skin and tweezing is difficult, soften skin with a lukewarm washcloth pressed against the desired tweezing area to help with the tweezing process. Tweezing after a warm bath or shower is ideal because the steam can warm the skin and make it easier to tweeze. 3. Brush target hairs in the direction of the hair's natural growth. 4. Avoid using creams or moisturizers that may cause the tweezer to slip or hard to control. 5. Isolate the hair you wish to tweeze. Hold the skin taut to prevent excess pulling. 6. Direct the tweezers so that you are tweezing the direction of the hair's growth. 7. Pull just one hair at a time to control the overall tweezing effect. 8. When holding the tweezers pull the hair gently but with a quick and smooth direction. Be careful not to yank or cut hair. Cutting hair at the surface may cause the development of ingrown hairs.

At the end of tweezing use Karin Herzog's Oxygen Body 3% Cream. This kills the bacteria, disinfects, calms down the skin (lessens redness) and hydrates. Sophia likes to use this product after waxing and tweezing her customers.

If the skin becomes red, after tweezing, hold an ice cube or cold ice pack over the area to reduce swelling, redness or pain.

Sophia said that "blood may occur if you're tweezing coarse hairs and are pulling out the entire bulb. When blood does occur make sure to wipe the blood away and use Karin Herzog's Oxygen Body 3% Cream or dab with hydrogen peroxide to disinfect the area."

Avoid plucking 1-2 days before the menstrual cycle until 1-2 days after, since more pain and discomfort may be felt at that time.

Tweezer Care & Related Tips

When possible avoid dropping the tweezers which can dull the point and actually throw the tool out of perfect alignment. When the tweezers come equipped with a cap or a storage tube, bag or box, store them inside to protect them and extend the life of the implements.

Many tweezer manufacturers advise against using tweezers to tweeze delicate nose hair or hair growing out of moles due to risk of infection.

Nose hair removal should be performed with a nose hair trimmer with rotating, recessed blades that never come into contact with the skin. Facial hair scissors should be used to remove hair growing from moles. Use a special tweezer for ingrown hairs or splinters.

Eyebrow hairs differ from hair on the head or other parts of the body in their growth cycles. Unlike scalp and body hair, the majority of eyebrow hairs are in the resting or telogen cycle. This means that eyebrow hair regrowth is much slower than other human hair. Therefore, avoid over tweezing eyebrow hair.

Types of Tweezers

Tweezers can be used on eyebrow hairs, stray facial or chin hairs, hairs on the stomach or other parts of the body. They come in all sizes, shapes, colors and price tags.

The key selection criteria for most people regarding tweezers is the tip. Some people are also more concerned about the material that the tweezers are made from. Tweezers can be made from stainless steel, metal or graphite. The tweezers you select are definitely a matter of personal opinion and should also be purchased so that they are comfortable for your hands and for the type of tweezing that you wish to do.

Sophia recommends "slanted tweezers as the best choice for most people because there will be less chance of breaking the hairs. Some people break off the hair before pulling it out. This leaves a tiny stumble or causes an ingrown condition".

Tweezer Shapes

Some of the most common shapes for these small forcep shaped tools designed to pull eyebrow and random body hairs include:

Regular tweezers are often used by men and women to tweeze their eyebrows or other random hairs because they are considered to be easy for at-home use.

Comfort Tweeze Crab Tip tweezers are designed specifically for people with sensitive skin.

Round tip tweezers combine the safety of a rounded tip with precision of a slant tip tweezer. A rounded tip tweezer is ideal as a first tweezer and for those men and women that prefer a rounded tip when tweezing.

Round tips are less likely to scrape against the skin.

There are also rounded slant tip tweezers known as Ramy tweezers.

Square tip tweezers are often used by both consumers and professionals because they are considered to be easy for at-home use.

Since square tips have a bit of a point, be careful when using that skin is not scratched or ripped.

Slant tip tweezers are often used by make-up artists, models and celebrities because they are considered to offer great tweezing advantages. Slant tip tweezer are very popular.

Sophia tells all of her clients to "only use the slanted tweezers because there is less risk of skin and hair injury or infection".

Slant tweezers are also available in a smaller Tweezerette version that are made in granite rather than stainless steel.

Special Purpose tweezers are often used to handle special issues such as hang nail tweezers (shown to the side) which are designed specifically to help remove hangnails.

The Hang Nail Tweezers as shown are make with evolutionary stainless steel with precise hand filed tips for cutting hangnails & cuticles without tearing skin. These tweezers innovatively combine cuticle nipper head with a traditional tweezer body for easy handling with an attached cuticle pusher that won't scratch nails.

Point tweezers are an incredibly precise tweezer designed for precision eyebrow work. They are guaranteed to grab the smallest and finest hairs. Ideal for ingrown hairs and stubble. Hand filed tips.

Sophia warns that unless you are extremely experienced in the art of tweezing you should avoid using these tweezers without the express supervision of your skin care expert.

Point tweezers are also available as pointed with a slant. These are less dangerous for private use but again, make sure that you use extreme caution.

Scissor tweezers actually have a scissor-like handle for tweezing. These tweezers are popular for people that have a difficult time using traditional tweezer bodies. They have often have a square tip. Care should be used when utilizing these tweezers.

Wide Grip Tweezers

Body Waxing Tweezers are wide grip tweezers often used by electrologists and body waxers. These special types of tweezers are ideal for removing difficult or coarse hairs from the chin or legs. The points can also be used for beard stubble and ingrown hair.

The body waxing tweezer is a favorite with hair removal experts and waxers. Sophia agreed that they are "ideal for chin and leg work". These types of tweezer easily grab difficult to reach hairs.

Sophia suggests that "extreme caution be used with these sharply pointed tweezers because they can cause scratching".

Slanted Wide Grip Tweezers are preferred by many people that tweeze their own eyebrows because the wide grip provides better control.

Wide grip tweezers are available with points or with slants. In some cases it is possible to purchase tweezers with slanted points.

Tweezer Myths

Does tweezing stimulate hair growth? Probably not. There are a lot of old wive's tales regarding what happens when you tweeze. Hair removal experts believe that hair growth is accelerated in recently tweezed sections of the body, which is due to genetic hair regeneration and not necessarily the indication of faster or thicker hair growth overall.

However, Sophia points out, "if you don't pull the right direction or keep breaking the hair at the roots it can cause infection in your hair follicle, it can cause ingrown hairs and it can eventually cause hair to grow back in coarser and darker."

Who Makes Tweezers

Tweezerman makes high end tweezers while Revlon and Sally Hanson make lower end tweezers. There are also a wide range of other tweezer manufacturers on the market. Select tweezers in your price range. Tweezerman does offer lifetime sharpening for all of their tweezers.

Summary

When it comes to hair removal, tweezing is one of the least expensive methods available for shaping eyebrows, removing pesky hairs and controlling unwanted hair growth all over your body.

Tweezers can be relatively inexpensive and can range in cost from just a few dollars to specialized tweezers that can cost in the $18-40 range.

Some tweezers have surgical precision tips, others are made of stainless steel.

When selecting a tweezer to use at home make sure that the two tips of the tweezers meet. Also, make sure that the tweezers have a good tip. Avoid using your tweezers on anything other than hair to avoid the points becoming dull or out of alignment.

If you want to talk more about this or other hair care articles on HairBoutique.com or anywhere else, please post a message on HairBoutique.com's Hair Talk Forums.

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