Threading is an ancient form of hair removal that is still widely practiced by
many people in the Eastern part of the world. The very first time I had
threading done on my face was when I was preparing for my wedding day. There was the final dress fitting, choosing the flowers for my wedding bouquet, choosing
the kind of makeup, picking a hair style and all the many, many things that a
bride needed to prepare for the big day. At the beauty salon, the hair
stylist/makeup artist recommended that I had my whole face threaded so that the
makeup would stay on better. In spite of being an Asian, it was the first time
I’ve heard of threading. At this time, I really did not have much facial hair to
speak of, but I gave it a try. The makeup artist pulled out a length of cotton
thread, and started to twist it around her fingers and held one end with her
teeth! Then she started to twist the thread over my face. I felt the thread
running back and forth over my face, pulling out whatever peach fuzz I may have
had. I did not think it was painful at all. It was the one and only time I had
my face threaded.
Since then, I have had my upper lip waxed at a salon, as well as using home kits. I’ve bleached, plucked and tweezed. I’ve even used depilatory creams. All of these methods have been successful up to a point. With waxing, it does not pull out every strand of hair. Sometimes, a couple needed to be plucked or tweezed. Depilatory creams and bleaches were painful for me as I
could feel them burning on my skin, leaving me red and raw. Now twenty years
later, I started to look into threading again. But not for myself, rather for my
pre-adolescent daughter who was starting to be conscious of what little facial
hair she had. She wanted it bleached, or waxed or to use a depilatory cream.
Knowing that her skin is super sensitive because of her age, I did not want to
subject her skin to any harsh chemicals. A friend from India suggested that I
had her face threaded. This friend came over to our house and threaded my
daughter’s upper lip. I was able to see for myself how threading works. As the
thread was twisted and pulled along my daughter’s upper lip, I saw how each hair
was snagged in the crisscross of the threads and lifted from the roots. I could
see tears spring up in my daughter’s eyes. But my daughter bravely put up with
the threading and was very, very pleased with the result. Threading removed the
hairs from the roots, and did not harm her skin at all. She was only a little
red for a few minutes.
In countries such as Taiwan and India, you can
find women sitting on stools at street corners, just like any other street
vendor, offering threading services. Threading is so cheap and very common
there.
Here in the United States, it’s not as easy to find a beauty
salon that offers hair threading services. Americans are more familiar with
waxing, shaving, bleaching and depilatory creams. Many Asians come to the U.S.
thinking they can find threading in any salon, but find to their surprise and
dismay that threading is almost unheard of. In big cosmopolitan cities like New
York, Chicago or LA, you can find some salons that offer threading. In smaller
cities, you’re out of luck.
We live in one of the Midwestern states, and
threading is not easily available here. Every time my daughter needed her upper
lip threaded, I had to call my friend. She was very happy to do it for us, but I
still felt that we were imposing on her. So we looked around for other options
and finally found a product from
http://www.facialhairthreading.com. The
product, Epicare, is a pencil-sized device that picks up on the same principle
of threading. However threading expertise is not needed as no thread is
required. It is actually made up of a spring which pulls hair from the roots by
snagging the hairs in the coils of the spring. It is very safe and natural as
there are no chemicals involved and therefore, perfect for my daughter’s
sensitive skin.
