In this short layered haircut with side bangs video, we take a look at how to create layers in short hair without it looking like a bubble. With short hairstyles, it’s easy for it to start to look like a bubble when you start adding texture and layers. Layered haircuts, and in particular short layered haircuts, you may want to approach it differently.

Russell Mayes, Director of Content for Jatai, creates the perfect short haircut with side swept bangs, reminiscent of the wedge haircut. This type of cut can be dome on straight hair, curly hair or even wavy hair. The wispy bangs are created as a result of combing the hair to the side. This haircut is not one you can easily do at home on yourself.

View the video and follow along with transcript below.

Short Layered Haircut with Side Bangs Tutorial:

Welcome to the Jatai Academy. Today we’re going to be working on layering short hair. Layering short hair is a different mindset than layering long hair because it’s real easy to get the shape kind of blocky and not have an even amount of volume. So I’m going to show you how to have a nice beveled full layered shape on shorter hair today. So let’s get started.

Building the Shape at the Nape

So I got my first section in the nape. It’s you know enough hair that I can start to see my shape and build a good guide, but it’s not the entire section. Some hair requires more section. Some hair requires less. So take whatever is appropriate for you to be able to build a solid shape and cut a clean line.

I’ll take a center section and I’m going to go in with my Jatai Tokyo Scissors. This is the 5 1/2″. I think that this scissor is the best all around scissor that you can get. For the price, it’s got a nice sharp blade. It’s pointy enough that I can get a real clean kind of cut if I’m detailing. But it’s not pointy so much that I will jab my finger every time I try to cut in my hand.

I’m going to start right in the nape with the comb away from me. Comb into my fingers and then I will go through and point cut a line straight across. From there I’ll use my comb. I got a little graduation from holding it in my finger. I will go through and cut that graduation off following the guide that I just put in. So anything that hangs out underneath that, I’ll cut off. So I’ve cut this straight across.

Beveling the Line

Now I can make a creative decision. Do I want to go longer in the front? Do I want to go neutral in the front? Or do I want to go shorter in the front. On this particular shape, I want to round that out a little bit so I’m going to angle my fingers going up a little bit. So I use that corner and then angle that line going up towards the face.

This is going to give me a little bit of a curve in the back as it starts to come around from the back into the front. Do the same thing on the other side and try to match it. This is the hardest part when you’re starting to bevel is to match the angles on both sides. So I may go a little longer than I think on this side knowing that I can go back and cut a little bit more off to make it match the other side.

So the next section that I take, I take half of what I had already sectioned out. Now from here the first section I held straight down here. Here I want to bevel this shape and curve it as I go up so it gives me a little bit more softness as I put my layering in. Now I’ll put two fingers underneath where before I had one.

Now I have two. So I’m lifting this a little bit higher following the previously cut guide as I go across cleaning it up going the opposite way. So now I’m starting to bevel that shape and I will follow the same line that I cut on the other side. Two finger elevation. There’s my line from underneath.

Oops! There we go. We’ve got that. Same thing on the opposite side. Two finger elevation. There’s my guide. Follow that through. Take the center, elevate. Now to three fingers. There’s my line in the middle. Follow my previously cut guide. Same thing on both sides.

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After I finished the nape you can start to see I have a nice little bevel going, but I still have a good solid shape. And I’m going to continue this same method until I run out of hair. So I will take a parallel section to my previous parting. Pin that out of the way and go through and do the same thing.

Beveling from Back to Front

But instead of using my fingers, because I’ve already used three fingers in the bottom, I’m going to start using the head shape. So the head shape is going to show me the elevation that I need to hold each section as I start to go up the head. There’s my elevation. There’s my line from underneath.

Point cut that through. There’s my line from underneath.

Cut that all the way through. You see my shape beveling up through there. So I’m very happy about that and there we go. As I continue to work up I need to add a little moisture to the hair.

Instead of using water I prefer to use a cutting lotion, and my cutting lotion of choice is Jatai Blade Glide. It gives a nice fine mist to evenly moisturize the hair, add a little bit of dampness. Also, it constricts the cuticle and gives you a cleaner cut.

Now we’re working on our last section and I’m continuing the elevation at whatever was at the top of the parietal ridge or the drop crown which is right there. This allows me to maintain a good solid beveled shape here underneath. I can always modify that more with my layering when I get to that point.

I’m going to take a natural part and find the high point of the head where the head peaks. From there I’ll take that right behind the ear on each side going to the mastoid process. After I’ve got the back sectioned off I’m going to go through and take a center section right down the middle.

From here I want to visualize where I want the shortest layer to fall. So I’m going to pick this up and kind of look and see where it’s going to want to fall. So there’s that right there. So I can always go back and take more off if I feel the need. So always error on the side of it being a little long than the error on the side of it being a little short.

I’m thinking that’s okay. And from there I will now continue to go through, hold everything out 90 from the head. Small piece is my guide and follow that all the way through until I run out of hair and I reached my bevel. Small piece as my guide and there we go right there.

We’re going to meet in the middle and blend everything through. I’ll pivot from the center over towards the right, combine the first section that I cut which was my guide with the second section, hold that 90° from the head. There’s my guide in the middle.

Cut that through. Remove most of that. Have a small piece as my guide. Comb these two in the center. Cut that down and through. My next section, there’s my guide from underneath.

Looking pretty good. So now I’ve got my first two sections done. I’m going to remove the center section that I just took, the first section I cut. Now I have my second section. I’ll add my third section to that and continue to pivot until I get over to the quarter part.

There’s my guide from underneath. Small piece as my guide. Pull that up and out. There we go. And follow that all the way around to the side.

My last section here on the right side. There is my guide from underneath, the previously cut guide. Pull that little bit out of the way. Take my next section, the center of both of those sections.

Blend that through and there we go. And I think that that’s looking pretty good. So now let’s go through and do the same thing on the other side. This is the last section on the opposite side. Pull that straight up. There’s my guide in the center. Follow that on through.

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And we’re finishing up there. That’s looking pretty good. I want to keep this front fairly solid, fairly heavy. I don’t want to layer this all the way around the front because I think it’s going to make it look like a little bubble.

So what I’m going to do is I’ll take a parallel section to my quarter part which I sectioned off for the back. I’ll take a parallel section to that and continue to pull this hair back to the previously cut hair. So I’ll pull this back straight up. There is my guide.

Cut that straight across. Small piece is my guide. Work this over to the right continuing to pull everything back past the quarter part into my previously cut hair.

My previously cut section, combing this hair back into that section. There’s my length. There’s my guide. Cut that down and through following my guide from the back. Now since none of this hair up front will reach I’m going to continue to pull everything back into my previously cut section and cut that through and across.

Small piece is my guide. Pull everything else back to my quarter part. Anything that sticks over cut off. That’s preserving my length around the front of the face. Same thing on the other side. Come here baby.

A lot of times on these mannequin heads they can be overly thick and a little stiff and it needs some texturizing to lighten it up. But a lot of clients have thick hair too.

So, on finer hair you may be done. You may need just a little lightening and softening on the ends, but on thicker hair you really need to remove some weight internally to give the hair a little bit more lightness and movement to it.

Softening the Shape

So I’m going to go through with my Tokyo Thinning Scissor which has enough teeth to remove some hair but not so much that you start to see gaps and lines in it. It’s seamless so I can go through and really remove a lot of hair in a soft way. So I’ll go through and take a vertical section right here on the side.

I’ll pin this out of the way so it doesn’t get in my way. I may take half of that and then from here about halfway and then feather that out through the ends.

Depending upon the thickness of the hair will determine how many times I hit it with the thinning scissor. I want enough to soften it but I don’t want so much that I destroy my shape.

If you’re worried, start somewhere in the back so if you over thin it, it’s not right in the front. When I go through and texturize I don’t want to do more than about halfway. Maybe underneath I can go a little bit deeper but here on the sides and the top about halfway is about as deep as I want to go.

Now by going through and doing this with my blade parallel to the head, all that’s going to do is remove weight and add softness. I’m not introducing any movement to it by angling of the scissor. About halfway. And go through and thin. There we go.

So now I’m just going to go through and continue this throughout the entirety of the head. Refine my outline and clean it up and give it a little bit more interest. Make the shape a little bit edgier and stronger around the perimeter.

Because the last thing I want is like a little bubble-do which short hair with layering is really easy to get just like little bubble shapes.

So one part of it has to have some kind of visual interest whether it’s more length somewhere, either the front or the back. The bangs got to be short. You got to have a little corner around the front. You got to have a little something so it just doesn’t look like a bubble.

So that’s why I pulled all the hair in the front back to give me a little bit more length around the front, especially around this little corner here which I’m going to carve that shape out a little bit more.

And I think that once we do that we’ll have a nice pleasing modern kind of shape. We got nice volume. We got some nice layering throughout the back. That’s a nice beveled pleasing shape and uh we got a nice little interest around the front.

I’m going to take a little of that off right through there. I don’t like that but there we go. Anyway, that’s a good way to layer shorter hair and still keep a nice even shape to it.

Please check us out at Jatai Academy. There’s all kinds of great information on there that will make you a better hairstylist and barber. Also, let us know what you’d like to see in the future. Leave a comment below and we’ll get right on that. Thank you so much for watching and we’ll see you next time.

Final Look of the Short Layered Haircut with Side Bangs

After styling the hair and creating an offset part, this creates some side bangs. FYI: The very short bangs in the picture were already there before this haircut. But they look cute with this style!

Final Thoughts on this Short Layered Haircut with Side Bangs

This type of haircut is not a type of pixie bob, wavy bob, short bob, layered bob or a pixie cut. It’s more of a wedge-inspired short cut. Using the hair’s natural texture and styling with a round brush or brush of choice, you can get this cute short layered hair with side bangs. You can always modify this style with choppy bangs, straight bangs or any other kind of bang.