I'm with Robbie on this. Mine was on the way out by my late teens so a regular grade 0 skim over with the Wahl is pretty much all I've ever done (apart from appalling and ill advised last dich attempts at a flat top and Weller centre parting)

Funnily enough, I don't think I'd have it back now if I could. I couldn't be done with the time and money a barber shop would take.

The only real issue I have is that if my head's not burning, it's freezing, so I've built up a huge collection of hats. Ball caps (bit preppy? Bit chav?) Newsboy ('Oi Oi Peaky Blinderrrrs!') watch caps (Oh Geno) I don't think any of them suit me particularly. If you're used to there not being anything 'up top' it doesn't look quite right for there to suddenly be a big lump of material there.

On the odd days when a hat isn't neccessary, I'm wary of sailing too close to skinhead territory, turned up jeans, longwings, bd, harrington. So go either soft ivy, corduroy or tweed, or old mod, desert boots, roll necks etc.

Of course, all the above does kind of rely on the idea that wherever I go people are watching, taking notes and trying to work out which youth cult this fifty year old knackered dad belongs to. Which I'm begining to suspect they're not.

Robbie's also right about those ageing mod feather cuts. I'm probably the most 'pro mod' on here, and I've never had any idea what that's all about

Last edited by Spendthrift (2022-12-15 03:52:25)

Hats are essential for anyone, not just the baldies. I say this as someone who is looking at having part of their nose lopped off and reconstructed due to a small sore patch that wouldn’t heal up, what seemed to be innocuous sun damage. Pissed off really as I’ve never been a sun worshipper or spent lots of time on beaches. I’ve been respectful of the sun for many years and made a point of wearing a hat. So take care you all and wear sunscreen.

Function trumps style and watch caps rule for me at the moment because it’s abnormally cold at the moment in the UK. I’ll do a baseball cap with a casual outfit, cheap ones look cheap and chavvy, so go for a better quality item from Ebbets Field or similar, they are fitted and don’t have the open bit and the adjustable strap at the back - looks much better. I like them well broken in with a good curve on the peak which should not be too long.

It’s a pity about the newsboy cap which used to be a niche thing, but has now gone mainstream since that crappy program. Every man and his dog are wearing them now. But I’ve a got a good collection and still use them.

Cotton rain hats are good for the summertime. I used to lean towards a pork pie but they now seem far closely too linked to Ska music and skin culture - clearly inappropriate for a man of advancing years.

I guess I'm lucky, I'll soon to waving goodbye to my 60's but I've still got a reasonable head of hair, going a bit thin on top but still enough there to balance out the rest of the barnet. My Mrs was a hairdresser many years ago and if I'm looking too much like a ' salty old dog' ( her words), needing a shave and the barnet going a bit wayward, she let's me know and gets out the scissors.

A good friend of mine in his early 60's has lost his hair, I've known him around 25+ years and he's never had hair in that time, last Friday in the pub we were sitting at the bar, it was busy, some chap standing behind him coughed or spluttered over his head, to say the least my friend wasn't happy, gave the chap a few choice words, asked for a napkin from the bar person to wipe his head, fortunately we were just leaving, probably see him again tomorrow I'll need to get the full lowdown then, he was too angry last week !

I've always had a problem with hats , they just don't suit me, I wear a cotton bb cap in the sun, woolly hat or Orvis waxed bb cap for dog walking, but beyond that I try to avoid hats, if I wear a flat cap I'm straight into Del Boy territory even without a sheepskin coat or medallion,

and like many of us posting here I'm doing my best to age gracefully,

FlatSixC- good advice on the hat front. I wear flat caps on a regular basis now, winter and summer. My optician recommended a peaked cap because I suffer with an eye problem and bright sunlight or reflection from snow is a problem. Sometimes I wear baseball caps.
Hats never used to suit me but now for some reason they  do.
Was 'Peaky Blinders' crap? I quite liked it. True all sorts of Herberts now wear flat caps but the more the merrier. Ha.

As an alternative to winter flat/newsboy caps, I recently bought a few wool mix ball caps from Amazon.
Very cheap but high % wool content and surprisingly good quality. Although unlined so not effective enough in this current bitter spell.
I do find I can’t wear a ball cap with anything smart like a sports coat. Which is a shame as many of the American and Japanese/Korean guys seem to carry that look off really well.

Kingy-I would like to be suited and booted more, as I was Monday to Friday when I was at work, or out and about afterwards. Wearing a tie is difficult.

I have some sympathy for this viewpoint but in all honesty I can't see myself wearing a suit, outside of a wedding or funeral, in the near future. Sad but true. I wanted a JS linen suit which I would have worn but they didn't have my size when I went there

Being that much younger, I still have a full head of hair and given how thick it is and how quickly it grows, I doubt that is going to change any time soon. I’m frequently told I look ten years younger than I am, which is always most gratifying. I used to wear a newsboy on occasion and I quite often stumble across a photo of myself in it now. I look a complete pleb in it and the cap was long ago left on a train or in the on back of a cab. I occasionally wear a woolen watch-cap at this time of year but generally I don’t bother with hats. I have long listed after an ebbetts field baseball cap but none of the teams really resonate with me.

2RS - ‘ What about the Prince/King Charles grown-out bald posh look - not exactly a comb over, but hair left to grow were it still emerges and then somehow manipulated into a style?’

I suppose he can’t look like a rough type. William is going down the same route although he’s already got less hair than the King, but he studiously avoids wearing a tie to avoid looking stuffy like Dad. When I first embraced the clippers in my thirties my mum said I looked like a convict, as at the time shorter hair wasn’t as common as it is now. It’s a style for the commoner and I can be as common as the best of them. The royals have to move slowly in these matters and have yet to join the 20th, sorry 21st century.

The shaved head has become so commonplace now it's hard to think that in the Eighties anyone with that look was to be avoided at all costs.

My hair starting falling out in my late teens and was pretty rubbish before that. So I'm grateful that shaved heads are more socially acceptable.

I now see it as a streamlined look that perfectly complements the neat lines of the clothes I wear.

To keep in neat takes work. It reinforces the clean cut aesthetic.

2RS -get a tan on your scalp and like me you can pretend to be Stanley Tucci

I'm another fully paid-up member of the Bald Ivy Social Club and like Spendthrift, "Funnily enough, I don't think I'd have it back now if I could. I couldn't be done with the time and money a barber shop would take."
Surprisingly - as a man that worries about almost everything - I don't think I have ever thought/stressed about being bald.
However, the original post has now got me thinking whether a bald head does in fact go with a traditional Ivy look.
I'll be up all night worrying about that now!

Face it, you're all skinheads now.

Better than a leonine backcomb or aristocratic wave around the ears I suppose.

Last edited by Streetlight (2022-12-17 02:55:39)

Clever lot those women. They’re not married at 19, three kids by mid twenties these days. Plus the ones on their second or third relationship.

If they’re going to wait a while, but still discount baldies, it’s a very small pool they’re drawing from

I’m seeing more and more women with tats on their face and neck now. I presume having run out of inkable space on the rest of their bodies?