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The Side Part Is the Navy Suit of Haircuts

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Grooming Simplicity Durability & Maintenance
Neo W.
Author
Neo W.
Writing about things that intrigue me.
Table of Contents

The Side Part Is the Navy Suit of Haircuts
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A good haircut sits between two failures: so fussy it eats your morning, or so utilitarian it looks like you’ve stopped caring. Most classic cuts are just different answers to that one problem.

The six
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  • Classic side part. Scissors only, no clippers. Cary Grant, Sean Connery, Don Draper. Two versions — longer and slicked with pomade for a 50s feel, or shorter with matte clay for something current. It frames a face the way a navy suit frames an outfit, which is exactly why it works on nearly everyone.
  • Slicked back. Straight back, no part. Gordon Gekko, Patrick Bateman, and lately a lot of finance. Needs a strong jaw and a full head of hair — if your hairline’s going, this points straight at it.
  • Curtains. Bangs falling forward. Big in the 90s with DiCaprio and Depp, back via Timothée Chalamet, and apparently traceable to Oscar Wilde. Youthful, a bit rebellious, reads more posh boy than professional. Also high maintenance — blow dryer, sea salt spray. Best if you’re young and not chasing authority yet.
  • Ivy League. A crew cut with a bit more on top. Less work than a side part, more considered than a buzz. Damon, Reynolds, Gosling, Pitt. Styles forward or down, so it’s two looks from one cut, and it survives thinner hair. Its flaw is that it’s unremarkable — nobody will compliment it, and nobody will ever think it’s wrong.
  • Pompadour. Serious volume at the front, from James Dean and Elvis. Looks great and costs you a blow dryer plus several products every morning. Tips into cartoon easily. The restrained version is roughly Harvey Specter.
  • High and tight. Very short or shaved sides into a longer top, military in origin, mainstream via Peaky Blinders. Almost no daily upkeep — product on top and out the door — but you’ll be at the barber constantly to keep the sides clean. Avoid the hard disconnected undercut; a gradual fade looks far better. People will assume military or police.

How to pick
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Four things decide it, and only one is about looks:

  • Your hair. Thickness, texture, how much volume it has on its own.
  • Your mornings. Be honest about how much you’ll actually do. A cut you won’t maintain is a bad cut regardless of how it looks in the chair.
  • Your face. Chiselled or soft, and how the hairline’s doing.
  • What you want to signal. Authority points toward the side part or Ivy League. Youth points toward curtains or a pompadour.

If you want the short version: the side part and the Ivy League are the two that are hard to get wrong. The slicked back and the pompadour ask for a specific face and full hair. The high and tight is clean but comes with associations. Curtains are fine while you’re young and actively work against being taken seriously.

The thing worth noticing
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The cuts that last aren’t the ones that look best in a photo. They’re the ones that still look right in ten years and don’t need a device to achieve.

Which is roughly the same principle as everything else in dressing well — most of the benefit comes from picking something durable and then not thinking about it again.

A few small things to try
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  • Work out how many minutes you’ll genuinely spend, then pick within that budget
  • If you’re between options, take the side part — it’s the safest good answer
  • Ask a barber what suits your face rather than bringing a photo of someone else’s
  • Pick something you could still be wearing in a decade

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