Side swept undercut hairstyle advice or better a taper cut?

[Freddie]

What do the barbers in the forum think of the side swept undercut hairstyle? I read the side swept guide in the forum, it recommends a taper cut. Is an undercut OK?

I ask for advice because with the undercut being so popular I am not sure how the side swept hair would look with a very short undercut. In my opinion it would kill the classic style a little and make the side swept more modern. Especially now with how I see lots of side swept undercuts with beards which looks like a cool trend. I'm just thinking of a medium length hairstyle to choose that I can convert with an undercut and the side swept looks like the perfect style to combine with other medium hairstyles. This is while I decide whether to grow my hair longer or not. Thanks for any help!!

[TheMensHairForum]

The side swept has been a classic hairstyle for men for decades and the classic setup of the side swept is with a medium taper haircut. That's how the guys in the 1930s did it and is brilliantly illustrated through the Gatsby hairstyle in The Great Gatsby movies of 1974 and 2013 starring Robert Redford (1974) and Leonardo DiCaprio (2013).

Having said the above, you can easily go with a side swept Undercut hairstyle. Such a hairstyle would have looked out of place in the 1960s but it won't nowadays with the Undercut being so popular. Likewise, the Undercut is a great haircut in that it emphasizes the hair on the top of your hair, so your side swept hair will look even better with an Undercut; that's provided if you use a good hair pomade like the Suavecito or Layrite pomades that we've discussed in the link and which we recommend as great pomades for the side swept style.

To give you an idea, this is how side swept hair looks like when styled with any of the pomades recommended above. The side swept in this picture doesn't have an Undercut:



Here are some hairstyle pictures of the side swept Undercut. You can see how the setup is very similar in that the hair is slicked (i.e. swept) to the side as if it were parted. You can absolutely get your side swept in an Undercut and it will look great and trendy in 2015 going on to 2016 as the Undercut remains almost a timeless men's haircut!













Just remember that a side swept hairstyle lies low on the scalp. Many people confuse the side swept with a side part, with the latter being parted (like a side swept) but having a lot more volume and not being flat. A side swept is what we call a flat hairstyle; another flat hairstyle is the slicked back Undercut which you will also be able to do with side swept hair with an Undercut.

The Undercut is quite a convenient haircut and will really make the hair on the top of you hair stand out, but just make sure that you style it appropriately as otherwise the Undercut will magnify the bad things of your hairstyle. All in all and in terms of hairstyle aesthetics, the Undercut acts as a magnifying glass for men's hairstyles.

As for what hair length to get for the side swept Undercut, go with the hair on the top of your head having 3 to 6 inches of hair length (choose one length so that the hair on the top is even), while the Undercut on the sides and back of the head should ideally be between a number 1 hair clipper length to a number 3 hair clipper length. Just chose any hair clipper length between a "number one" and a "number three" as the Undercut is a single length haircut!

Lastly, be aware that many websites out there have wrong information about the Undercut. The will label any short taper cut as an Undercut and, by default, men who are looking for information about hairstyles get confused about what it is that they want for their hair.

To give you an idea, I've seen many websites label a haircut (on the sides) as the one in the picture as an Undercut, when in reality that's a short taper haircut.