How to Pluck Pubic Hair

When a smooth and hair-free bikini line is what you're after, you're willing to give a variety of hair-removal methods a try. Plucking your pubic area might seem daunting, especially when you have more than a few hairs to eliminate. Trusty tweezers can help you eliminate a few stray hairs down there -- leaving that silky smooth bikini line.

When to Pluck

Plucking pubic hair isn't going to replace shaving or waxing of this delicate area. Think of tweezing as a touch-up treatment in between more extensive hair-removal processes. If your shower shave missed a few stray hairs, try plucking to pull the remaining sparse hairs from the root. Likewise, when a bikini or brazilian wax begins to grow out, pull out your tweezers to eliminate those scattered hairs.

Advantages of Plucking

Plucking your bikini line is a convenient and cost-effective option. You probably already have a pair of tweezers that you use for other beauty treatments, such as shaping your brows. If you don't, you can snag a pair at your local drugstore for a few dollars. Plus, tweezing takes just a matter of minutes, so you can quickly clean up your bikini link before slipping into your suit and heading to the beach.

Plucking Tips

Plucking is best reserved for the occasional hair that pops up on your bikini line. Before targeting that unwanted fuzz, make sure your tweezers are clean and rust-free. Choose an angled pair of tweezers, and use the angled side to swiftly pull stray hairs out from the root.

Plucking Risks

Plucking can be a painful process. Imagine tweezing every pubic hair, and you can envision the potential for serious and prolonged discomfort in such a sensitive area.

Along with this discomfort comes potential skin irritation from tweezing. In addition to red bumps on the affected area, you might notice inflammation of the bikini line as well. This inflammation is often caused by ingrown hairs, which occur when the tweezed hair fails to grow out of the skin; instead, it curls under itself and grows under the skin's surface.

Ingrown hairs can occur anywhere hair grows, but they're especially common in areas where coarser hair grows, including along the bikini line. Tweezing is a hair removal method more likely to cause ingrown hairs because you may fail to remove the hair from the root when you tweeze -- and any remaining hair under the skin's surface may grow inward.

Signs of an ingrown hair include an inflamed hair follicle and visible red bump. Ingrown hairs will usually dissipate on their own -- simply avoid tweezing the area again until it heals.