Six Nations Men's Grooming (From Western Telegraph)

Six Nations Men's Grooming

1:15pm Saturday 6th February 2010 in Beauty blog By Lisa Mansell

I LOVE Rugby and I feel I am most certainly not alone in this passion, as my facebook page shows today, with all the good luck messages to Wales and teasing of the English. However I am not just a rugby fan when the six nations is on, I watch rugby every weekend and will sometimes watch all of the games played by the regions and then Scrum V too!!!!

But today it’s got me thinking about how the rugby players themselves have changed over the last ten years as was certainly highlighted in the rugby in the noughties programme this week. For example shaving and waxing body hair has become very popular amongst rugby players as the hair free look on the legs, makes their muscles look better, now I haven’t had any men asking for their legs to be waxed but I have had chest, shoulder and back wax, male clients and it seems to be growing in popularity, especially with men in their twenties and thirties. I also think that Women’s opinions have influenced this somewhat.

Men are paying more attention to their brows as well; the mono-brow is not a good look so they are asking for advice on tweezing those pesky centre hairs away or doing it in secret!!! This is tricky as they really don’t want to have beautifully sculpted brows like Joey tries in a memorable Friends episode when he visits a beauty salon.

Fake Tan is also evident with the Welsh Rugby squad, James Hook and Andy Powell are so easy to spot on the field as they have that tell tale orange glow around them as if they only ever eat Ready Brek. The craze for deep tans seems to be over, thank goodness, but a subtle hint of colour is much nicer and more flattering. I’m not going to comment on sunbeds now, that’s a huge issue for me and I’ll have a good old rant about that another day.

I also think David Beckham has a lot to answer for in his choice of hairstyle and the influence that he has for men across the country, but our Welsh Rugby stars have their very own particular styles, think Adam and Duncan Jones and the ultimate Shane Williams. Shane has sported a diverse range of hair styles in the last ten years that I have seen imitated in many a Welsh town and who can blame them for he is a legend.

So Men’s style and grooming has changed quite dramatically over the decade and the metrosexual tag seems to apply to more and more men, but I think it just shows how fashions come and go for men as they do for women. For women the eighties are back, but I’ll be gob smacked if the mullet with perm ever comes back for men !!!