Fall is the perfect time to start growing a beard. It will give you time to have a nice, full beard by winter, plus protect your face from the crisp cold air. What you don't want is a dry, fuzzy looking mass of facial hair, dried and frizzed from the elements.
Keeping your beard in top condition is important, especially if you spend a lot of time outdoors. Here are 3 tips to help produce a beard that looks fuller, feels soft, and resists the damaging effects of cold weather.
Trim to Train
If you want to have an impressively full beard, it's going to take some care. You don't need to spend hours at the vanity mirror, but you do need to give you beard some proper attention. If your design is for a short beard, make certain you invest in a quality trimmer, with multiple length settings.
When you want to grow a full beard, aka: the "chin pillow", you still want to trim lightly, but trim somewhat more often. You're going to find different places on your face that will produce hair at a slightly different speed. That's why you need to touch up the short, tightly tucked beard frequently. Longer beards you need to focus on bad ends and training.
This is also one reason why you want to even up a longer beard regularly, to help train its shape. No matter what length you're trying for, this will keep your beard even and full. Trimming the ends of a longer beard, will also keep it even and softer to the touch, by removing split ends. When you keep your beard properly trimmed, it will grow fuller and be trained perfectly.
Proper Cleaning & Washing
Yes, a long beard will be subject to the same problems longer hair creates. This means soaps, oils, and everyday exposure to the elements will dry your beard. It can develop split ends, just like the hair on your head. Make sure you treat your beard like hair, by not subjecting it to harsh body soaps every day.
If you're keeping a short beard, you can use special face soap with a mild moisturizer component. Longer beards need to be treated more like longer hair. The same soap you use to wash your body will strip your beard of essential oils. Use a mild shampoo, especially on a full beard. You also don't want to wash your beard every single day, stripping it of its natural oils.
You can add a mild leave-in conditioner to maintain your beard, or use specialized beard oils to keep it soft, plus help train it. If you wash and condition your beard regularly, it will grow full and you will not find as many split and frayed ends to trim off.
Feed the Beard
Just like muscles, skin and other growing and changing parts of your body, your beard feeds off nutrients. Your hair follicles benefit from the same source of mineral supplements that other parts of your body need for healthy growth.
You should already try to consume a balanced diet, but adding certain vitamins will boost your hair growth rate, especially your beard. There are essentially 11 major vitamins that promote hair growth. The largest percentage is from the B-Vitamin family, plus the old staple supply of Vitamin C helps your hair stay healthy.
If you really want to ignite the growth speed of your beard, you can take what is referred to as a hair-growth cocktail. This is a combination of many of the useful vitamins, plus some safe, all-natural additives that feed your beard.
If you follow these three tips, regular trimming, proper cleaning, and a vitamin boost to speed up hair growth, you'll soon have the beard your friends will envy. Keep in mind that genetics play a part in how fast and full your beard will grow, so be patient. However, if you follow these recommendations, you'll be able to grow a fantastic fall beard.