Dreadlock beards date back to ancient civilizations. Creative and unique beard dreads completely change the look of your beard style and garner lots of attention.
So, long beard hair can be braided or twisted easily with wax to achieve this unique look. In this guide, we’ll show you how to get a dreadlock beard and how to maintain it easily even when wet.
Beard rings are a unique and trendy. If you want super stylish dreads, checkout the best beard jewelry on Amazon.com now.
What are Beard Dreads?
Beard dreads are intertwined locks of facial hair, created by rolling, matting or braiding the hair – AKA “ratting”. Beard dreadlocks are typically grown from the longest hair (6 inches or longer) along the chin and jawline into rope-like strands using wax to tighten the tangles.
How to Dread Your Beard
Anyone can dreadlock their beards, but certain hair texture is easier for locks than others. If you find your hair doesn’t stay twisted, then wash your beard for a few days.
In this step-by-step approach, we’ll show you how to create dreadlocks for your beard.
It’s important to grow out your beard first so you have enough hair to work with, although shorter dreadlocks can also be created with this method.
1. Section Off Your Beard Hair
How many dreads do you want to create? Most long beards can be separated into 2 to 6 dreads or more, depending on the length and thickness. If you have a lot of beard hair, you can likely create multiple, thin locks.
When parting your beard hair, you’ll create one-inch wide sections, but you can also choose shorter widths if you want a full dreaded beard.
To dreadlock these sections, you’ll twist the strands from the roots, making sure that the strands stay together.
2. Tease or “Rat” Your Beard
To “rat your hair” means using a fine-tooth beard comb to push up your hair twists from the bottom of the strands. Do this to tighten the twist and push it up closer to your face while creating volume.
When you rat a section of your hair, you’ll notice that the twisted part has coiled up tighter and shortened the length of the section.
After doing this to all the dreadlocks, your hair should look a bit tangled and messy, but you’ll be able to identify each twist.
3. Finish the Lock with Wax
Taking a small dab of dread wax, beard wax or beeswax for hair, rub your finger and thumb together to spread the wax over your fingers and make it more malleable.
Next, apply this small layer of wax to the ratted parts of your beard hair. You’ll do this for each strand you want to dreadlock.
For the best finishing results, Murray’s Pure Australian Black Bees Wax is a must. It perfectly seals ends and conditions hair at the same time.
Your dreads will grow and get longer each week, and you must keep twisting them in place to ensure that they grow long.
4. Add Beard Rings and Accessories
We love Viking and Celtic beard styles that use steel rings and beads to decorate their beard strands. You can wrap these steel rings around single dreadlocks for a truly creative look.
Look at some ways we can style beards with steel tubes, rings, and beads:
Check out Viking Braid Hairstyles to complete your Viking look.
5. Groom Your Dreads
Dreadlocks don’t require a lot of maintenance, but you still want to apply a moisturizing cream to the skin underneath your beard.
You’ll likely need to twist and rat your dreads again if they start falling out, although steel tubes and rubber bands help to keep your dreads from loosening.
The Most Hardcore Dreadlock Beards
Beard dreads are incredibly popular with many musicians and artists – even Johnny Depp rocked dreadlocks at one point. We found some of the best beard dreadlocks to show you.
