Experience the art and culture of a Turkish haircut
A good way to experience the culture is to get a men's Turkish haircut. It is a form of art and a national treasure!
Discover all about getting a men's haircut in Turkey. Watch out for the fire!
Turkey: Must do list
Drink çay
Eat pide
Visit Ephesus
Shop in the bazaar
Get a men's haircut!
Read about...
What you will find here
- A national treasure
- Enjoy the hospitality
- The artist at work
- Compliments
- Video of one of my Turkish haircuts
- Read Turkish Style and Travel books
- Before: An old Turkish haircut! ... and after: a new Turkish haircut!
- Other Turkish Barber Experiences
- Turkish haircuts
- Travel to Turkey
- Share your Turkish haircut experience
- Know a local Turkish barber?
- More haircut websites
- Experience more of Turkey
A national treasure
A skilled profession
The apprentices spend many hours just watching, cleaning and preparing equipment before they are even allowed to touch the hair.
Enjoy the hospitality
Time to relax before your haircut
Hospitality Turkish Style
Lots of Tea (Çay) and Coffee (Kahve)
When you're trying to buy souvenirs (or trying NOT to buy) you get offered Turki...
Requisite Turkish Coffee. Yum. Foamy, and silty at the bottom, but you can't ski...
onboard a ship at the Bosperus
A guy delivering Turkish tea around
The artist at work
Earth - Water - Wind - Fire
This is followed by a wet cut.
If you have a beard or mustache, this is trimmed and shaped if required. Plenty of shaving cream with the long handled razors.
Any extra hair on the face is either waxed with a pine resin, pulled out with tweezers or string. A cotton thread is twisted and the resulting loop is opened and closed over the hair to be removed. Nose hair is trimmed with small scissors.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the haircut is when the barber dips a ball of cotton wool in methylated spirits. Perhaps you think this is for cleaning something? Not exactly. It depends on how you define cleaning. They then set fire to this and flick the flames into your ears to burn the hairs. Also any stray hairs on your face.
Finally the hair is washed. Then blow dried. Then gel is applied. Followed by hair spray and deodorants.
"the barber dips a ball of cotton wool in methylated spirits... they then set fire to this and ..."
Compliments
Customary sayings
An appropriate response might be "Elinize sağlık" - "Health to your hands".
You will probably get a lot of compliments from people about your hair - mostly "Sıhhatler olsun". This should not be confused with similar sounding phrases: "Saatler olsun" which means may you have lots of clocks; or "Saçlar olsun" meaning may you have many hairs.
Video of one of my Turkish haircuts
Read Turkish Style and Travel books
Before: An old Turkish haircut! ... and after: a new Turkish haircut!
Other Turkish Barber Experiences
- Salon Wanderlust | The mystic-barber of Selçuk
- The mystic-barber of Selçuk: How a tonsorial teen in Turkey helped me understand the revelations of Rumi. By Gary Mex Glazner
- Badgers Forward: A Turkish Haircut
- ...I decided that I needed the "experience" of the Turkish Barber Shop...
- Mark's Turkish Haircut
- Steps for a Turkish Haircut 1. Wash hair bending forward over the sink 2. Cut the sides and back with a No 3 hair clippers (20mins) 3. Then feather in the No 3 area from zero to No3...
- The Turkish Invasion: Getting a haircut
- A Turk in Russia missing the experience of home, compares Russian and Turkish barbers.
- Getting Burned in Turkey
- "What happened to your eyebrows?" my girlfriend, Ana, asked me the other day...
- Turkish Haircut » griffhome.com
- Turkish Haircut
So Dave and I felt the need to loose a little extra fluff around the ears. Walking into the barber we saw close to the Aya Sophia Dave says, "Give us a haircut and make us look like a Muslim Turk!" - The barbershop connection
- Turkish barbers are not just great for haircuts. They are also an excellent source of advice.
"A new arrival to Istanbul recently came to me for advice on how to find reliable repairmen in her neighborhood. As I recounted to her the trials and tribulations of numerous expats before her in their own searches conducted for worthwhile ustas, her eyes widened in horror at the thought of what lay..." - Efe - The Art of Turkish Barbering
- Efe - The Art of Turkish barbering. Barbering is an art of Turkish culture. The art of barbering, preserved from the Ottoman period to the present day, had been carried out in a master-apprentice relation within mutual respect and love and in obedience to Turkish ways and customs.
- C-17 Daddy: Turkish Haircut
- Went for a haircut today. I was badly in need of one. I walked into the barber shop on base here at Incirlik AB, Turkey and ...
- Please Do Not Burn The Hair Out Of My Ears With A Flaming Cotton Ball | Turkish Phrases Blog
- A humorous article about a barber shop experience in Turkey.
- A Turkish Haircut « A Foreign Perspective
- A Turkish haircut lover sharing about life in Adana
- Henry North London: The Turkish Barbers
- A Turkish haircut experience in London.
- Tosif Trekking International Inc.: My Turkish Haircut
- I have always been blessed with a more than liberal amount of hair. Occasionally this has been the focus of humorous comments and rarely it has caused logistical problems...
Turkish haircuts
Action shots
Famous Turkish shave! To finish off after a thorough shave, the
After a hard day climbing mountains, it was time for a good Turkish haircut and ...
Travel to Turkey
Come and experience it for yourself
Share your Turkish haircut experience
Chadrew wrote...
Sounds fascinating. Two hours is surely a long time though. Hehe.
Posted February 18, 2009
nickclaw wrote...
I really like this lens! Very informative. And the barbershop is a great place to practice Turkish phrases!
Posted October 17, 2008
ZBT wrote...
For a girl, I wear my hair ultra, ultra short - so, I can really appreciate your lens on Turkish haircuts. Really cool. I learned something new. Thanks!
Posted October 10, 2008
ZBT wrote...
For a girl, I wear my hair ultra, ultra short - so, I can really appreciate your lens on Turkish haircuts. Really cool. I learned something new. Thanks!
Posted October 10, 2008
chubred00 wrote...
I love this lens! What a wonderful tribute to this remarkable experience. I love getting my haircut here. One thing you fail to mention is the great relationship that one forms with his barber after repeated visits. You're treated as a family member visiting from out of town every time you return. It's a great experience.
Posted August 05, 2008
Amanda_Blue wrote...
This is an amusing but also very interesting lens, which I find particularly fascinating as my father was a Greek born in the early 1900's in Istanbul (then called Constantinople.) Thank you for an eye-opening look at the Turkish people. 5*
Posted June 22, 2008
thoughtful wrote...
This is a very unique and interesting lens. Now that I am living in the UK Turkey holiday destination that I hear good things about. Thanks for the info.
Posted February 21, 2008
you really did a great job by sharing about culture ,it will be very helpful for those who are planning to visit that place, great work!great lens i feel happy if you would see my lens:
RomanticCheapDateIdeas
Posted February 11, 2008
Know a local Turkish barber?
Let everyone know where you can get a Turkish haircut
If you have a local Turkish barber, please provide their location. When there are a few entries, I will add a map. I am particularly interested in finding barbers outside of Turkey. My own barber however, will remain secret - I don't want everyone crowding into his little shop and making the queue for haircuts longer than it is.
More haircut websites
Stories about haircuts from around the world
- The Haircut Story Site
- User submitted stories about haircuts
- The Haircut Site
- Everything on guy's haircuts! Updated every Saturday
- 1hss.com
- Haircutting and head shaving stories
- HaircuttingStories.com
- Older version of the 1hss.com website with earlier haircutting and head shaving stories
- Street Use: Outdoor Barbers in India
- Streetside barbers are quite common in India, at least in the smaller towns.
- MopShots | Find the Perfect Hair Style and Best Hair Salons in Your City
- A photo guide to local hair stylists. Mainly women's styles at the moment.
Experience more of Turkey
Some more of my lenses about living and business in Turkey
Between haircuts I am busy living and doing business in Turkey. Check out my other lenses on life and work in Turkey.-
Living in Turkey : Housing
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Turkey is a land of huge contrasts. Rich and poor, young and old, ancient and modern, East and West. Living here is a privilege and an awesome cultural experience! Century old Greek style villas, brand new multi-million dollar apartment complexes, p...
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Now You're Talking Turkey
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A Lens of Business Development Experiences in Turkey. Step 1. Get yourself to Turkey. Step 2. Get a haircut and a real job. Step 3. Enjoy! The Turkish people are generally friendly and helpful and Turks love to shop. Turkey's location - bridging Euro...
by Peter.Murray
I am an entrepreneur, originally from New Zealand, living and doing business in Turkey because of the great culture and lifestyle and the many opportu...
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