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| ‘Friends stared at me dumbfounded’: Guardian Australia staff share their most traumatic haircuts. What was yours? | ‘Friends stared at me dumbfounded’: Guardian Australia staff share their most traumatic haircuts. What was yours? |
| (1 day later) | |
| A viral video of a barbershop blow-up prompts tales of shear panic. Tell us about your worst haircut experience in the comments | A viral video of a barbershop blow-up prompts tales of shear panic. Tell us about your worst haircut experience in the comments |
| A tradie went viral this week after blowing up at a barber who he claimed left him with a lopsided buzz cut. | A tradie went viral this week after blowing up at a barber who he claimed left him with a lopsided buzz cut. |
| The tradesman insisted on paying for the allegedly substandard haircut before storming out. The exchange has sparked a conversation online, with some saying they would never be brave enough to complain and others recounting their worst haircut experiences. | The tradesman insisted on paying for the allegedly substandard haircut before storming out. The exchange has sparked a conversation online, with some saying they would never be brave enough to complain and others recounting their worst haircut experiences. |
| Here Guardian Australia writers – in what almost became a group therapy session – tell us about their worst haircuts. You can share yours in the comments below. | Here Guardian Australia writers – in what almost became a group therapy session – tell us about their worst haircuts. You can share yours in the comments below. |
| Graham Readfearn | Graham Readfearn |
| I was in the middle of an almost year-long backpacking trip around the world in 2000. My hair was getting what I’d describe as quite lustrous but my then girlfriend had another word. Anyway, we were in a town somewhere south of Santiago and I gave in and found a barber. I emerged into the Chilean sun looking like the love child of a 1960s Paul McCartney and Sharon Strzelecki. At least I didn’t stick out – every other male seemed to have the same haircut. And no, I don’t have pictures. | I was in the middle of an almost year-long backpacking trip around the world in 2000. My hair was getting what I’d describe as quite lustrous but my then girlfriend had another word. Anyway, we were in a town somewhere south of Santiago and I gave in and found a barber. I emerged into the Chilean sun looking like the love child of a 1960s Paul McCartney and Sharon Strzelecki. At least I didn’t stick out – every other male seemed to have the same haircut. And no, I don’t have pictures. |
| Janine Israel | Janine Israel |
| When I moved to London, paying for a haircut seemed prohibitively expensive. So I signed up to be a “hair model” (AKA guinea pig) at a fancy salon in Covent Garden. The waiver I signed meant I was handing myself over to the stylist to do whatever they pleased. My hairdresser said he wanted to replicate the hairstyle he’d given the day before to a woman with dead-straight blond hair on my shoulder-length brown curls. Then he proceeded to cut my hair to the length and shape of a cheap clown wig, with a bizarre band of 2cm-long tufts around the hairline. It might have looked edgy on the blond but on me it looked like a lawnmower had broken down midway doing through the job, and from the horrified look on the hairdresser’s sweating face, he knew it. | When I moved to London, paying for a haircut seemed prohibitively expensive. So I signed up to be a “hair model” (AKA guinea pig) at a fancy salon in Covent Garden. The waiver I signed meant I was handing myself over to the stylist to do whatever they pleased. My hairdresser said he wanted to replicate the hairstyle he’d given the day before to a woman with dead-straight blond hair on my shoulder-length brown curls. Then he proceeded to cut my hair to the length and shape of a cheap clown wig, with a bizarre band of 2cm-long tufts around the hairline. It might have looked edgy on the blond but on me it looked like a lawnmower had broken down midway doing through the job, and from the horrified look on the hairdresser’s sweating face, he knew it. |
| Nick Miller | Nick Miller |
| Quite early in my career at the West Australian newspaper I switched from dark brown to blond hair, for no clear reason I can now remember. They stopped sending me to political doorstops as a brand protection measure. After that I had bright red hair and an eyebrow ring, again I can’t recall why, and they switched me to a desk-bound column job for a while, and the main editorial cartoonist drew a caricature that senior editors shared around afternoon news conference. | Quite early in my career at the West Australian newspaper I switched from dark brown to blond hair, for no clear reason I can now remember. They stopped sending me to political doorstops as a brand protection measure. After that I had bright red hair and an eyebrow ring, again I can’t recall why, and they switched me to a desk-bound column job for a while, and the main editorial cartoonist drew a caricature that senior editors shared around afternoon news conference. |
| Luca Ittimani | Luca Ittimani |
| I went on a TV show and said if I won the trophy I’d get a bowl cut with it. I won, and my mate put the trophy on my head and chopped. I do not have the straight Beatle-style locks required to keep a bowl cut flat so it just looked like half my normal wavy hairdo had gone missing. | I went on a TV show and said if I won the trophy I’d get a bowl cut with it. I won, and my mate put the trophy on my head and chopped. I do not have the straight Beatle-style locks required to keep a bowl cut flat so it just looked like half my normal wavy hairdo had gone missing. |
| But I was committed – I kept the cut for nearly a month, the constant expansion of the hair above my ears only accentuated by the absence of anything below. Who knew my forehead could look so big? | But I was committed – I kept the cut for nearly a month, the constant expansion of the hair above my ears only accentuated by the absence of anything below. Who knew my forehead could look so big? |
| Ben Doherty | Ben Doherty |
| I’ve got a mate who’s a rock star. He’s admirably self-effacing about it but that’s what he is: a bona fide, write-it-on-your-tax-return rock star. We used to kick around in bands together but he was always destined for greater things: his life is now sold-out stadiums across the US, pool parties with the Wu-Tang Clan, his face on T-shirts. | |
| Allied to his extraordinary musical talent, this man has an effortless, charming charisma. He went and got a haircut that was very cool at the time: a supremely high buzz cut up the sides, betopped by a cheeky fringe. He wore it, it looked amazing. I thought, “Yeah, I could totally nail that.” | Allied to his extraordinary musical talent, this man has an effortless, charming charisma. He went and got a haircut that was very cool at the time: a supremely high buzz cut up the sides, betopped by a cheeky fringe. He wore it, it looked amazing. I thought, “Yeah, I could totally nail that.” |
| I did not nail it. It was awful and aggressive and made me look thuggish. Photos from the time make me cringe. I think I ended up just shaving my head and starting again – chastened and altogether more careful about trying to be cool. | I did not nail it. It was awful and aggressive and made me look thuggish. Photos from the time make me cringe. I think I ended up just shaving my head and starting again – chastened and altogether more careful about trying to be cool. |
| Gabrielle Jackson | Gabrielle Jackson |
| I was going through a major life change in London – I’d quit my job and was planning to travel and write a book, so felt I needed a new haircut to reflect the new me. I decided to leave my old hairdresser of many years, thinking she was too edgy and “didn’t get me”. So I tried out a new, very expensive and “trendy” hairdresser in London, who had given a friend the most perfect bob. At this new place they give you a glass of wine before the cut, so the stylist can get to you know you. Overcome by how cool the hairdresser was, I gave my consent to an asymmetrical bob. | I was going through a major life change in London – I’d quit my job and was planning to travel and write a book, so felt I needed a new haircut to reflect the new me. I decided to leave my old hairdresser of many years, thinking she was too edgy and “didn’t get me”. So I tried out a new, very expensive and “trendy” hairdresser in London, who had given a friend the most perfect bob. At this new place they give you a glass of wine before the cut, so the stylist can get to you know you. Overcome by how cool the hairdresser was, I gave my consent to an asymmetrical bob. |
| It was so bad – everyone I knew just stared at me dumbfounded. I went out for a drink and who was the only other person in the bar? My old hairdresser! And I felt personally attacked by the Fleabag asymmetrical bob storyline. | It was so bad – everyone I knew just stared at me dumbfounded. I went out for a drink and who was the only other person in the bar? My old hairdresser! And I felt personally attacked by the Fleabag asymmetrical bob storyline. |