Skin Fade

A skin fade in Sudbury done properly: bald at the bottom, blended up through every guard with no line you can point at. The whole job is the blend. Anyone can take the sides off — the work is in the two inches where skin turns into hair without a visible step.

Low, mid or high

The three are not styles so much as heights, and picking the right one is about your head rather than the photo on your phone.

• Low fade — the skin sits just above the ear and follows the hairline round. The most conservative of the three and the easiest to grow out.
• Mid fade — the skin starts around the temple. The default for most people, and what is meant when someone just says “fade”.
• High fade — the skin runs up to the parietal ridge, the corner where the side of your head turns into the top. Sharpest of the three and the most obvious when it grows out.

You will be asked which one before the guard goes on. If you are not sure, say so and it will be talked through against how your hair grows and where your hairline actually sits.

What happens in the chair

The bulk comes off first, then the fade is built from the bottom up — foil or zero-guard at the skin, then each guard blended into the one below with the lever open and closed rather than a single pass. The top is cut to suit the height of the fade: a high fade with a heavy top reads as a disconnect, which is a different cut and needs asking for.

Finished with the hairline lined out, the neck cleaned, and the shape checked in the mirror from both sides.

How often to come back

Two to three weeks, honestly. A skin fade is the shortest-lived cut there is — the bald section is the first thing to grow, and at three weeks the blend it was built on has stopped being a blend. If you want it to look like it did on day one, book on a cycle rather than waiting until it bothers you. A line-up at the two-week mark buys another week.

What it costs

$40, flat, and it takes about fifty minutes because the blending does. Add the beard and it becomes a cut and beard at $50 with the beard line taken off the same fade, so the two meet at the sideburn instead of fighting each other.

See recent fades from the chair or book a time.