Wait, I know what you’re thinking. Grooming tips for men?! Before you faint and call the ambulance, let me explain myself. As you probably already know, dweam.com is a Singapore Beauty Blog. As much as 99.9% of my posts have been dedicated to beauty tips for women, my sole purpose of blogging has always been to make everyone beautiful. A month ago, I tweeted that precise statement and instantly got a response from a bunch of guys who asked if my audience included men.

The mere thought of being men being “beautiful” probably sounds unlikely but nevertheless, I said, “Why not?”. No body ever said that there couldnt be beauty tips for men. Of course, no one actually calls them beauty tips for men. After consulting the men around me, they agreed grooming tips for men definitely sounds like a more appropriate and macho term.

Well-groomed men come across as more polished and definitely more attractive than your average mortal. If a guy carries himself well, smells amazing and looks clean, he’s bound to turn to some heads for all the right reasons. Compared to someone who’s got snot hanging from his nose, greasy hair and smells of garbage, the only thing he’ll be turning is noses up in the air. Now boys, I know the concept of “taking care of yourself” seems as foreign as life on another planet, but let’s start with some easy grooming tips for men to get you on your way.

1) Using deodorant or antiperspirant
Deodorant helps to mask or remove the smell that potentially may emanate should you perspire. So, you get to be naturally sweaty yet still smell nice. Antiperspirants, as the name suggests, prevent you from perspiring, therefore preventing any smell from resulting at all.

Can you imagine looking mighty fine in your brand new silk shirt and dazzling cuff links. But when you raise your arm to call the waiter, to get the file on the top shelf or simply to just stretch, you look over to your left and see the look of horror on the nearest female’s face. Why? Because sweaty underarm patches are not cool. FACT.

Firstly, sweaty underarm patches ruin your very nice shirt. Secondly, they smell. It’s no big secret that everybody perspires. I’m not going to lie and say girls smell like flowers all the time. I’ve been around girls who stink and science has shown that women actually have more bacteria under their arms than men. More bacteria means more bad smell. The secret, however, to smelling like a you live in a perfume store is to either mask, eliminate or prevent bad smell.

2) Rinsing with mouth wash
I’ll give everyone the benefit of doubt and assume everyone knows how to brush their teeth. Flossing definitely gives you extra points, but if you’re too lazy to do either one, here’s the next best thing: CHEAT with mouth wash. Mouth wash cleans your mouth of bad bacteria. No bad bacteria means no bad smell! A couple of rinses makes a girl wanna kiss you more.

3) Spraying cologne
My girl friends and I really appreciate a man who smells clean. We know we cant always ask for the moon. But we say if he smells amazing, he scores an extra 10 points immediately. This is where cologne comes in.

Some smells make me swoon (in a good way) while others just make me dizzy and want to throw up. Good smells usually come from pretty bottles like this. Inside these pretty bottles is liquid that smells nice. Pay attention boys, this is what we call cologne. Cologne is worn after you’ve showered and used deodorant or antiperspirant. I have a few favourites that I like my boys to wear. In fact, every girl has a preference for a certain smell, so I’ll leave you to find out which cologne it is in particular that drives your dream girl crazy.

If you’ve made it this far and havent given up reading, I applaud you. Because of that, I’m going to try my luck and push things a little further. On top of the three things I mentioned above, I challenge the boys reading this to maintain a basic skin care routine just like the girls. Nothing fancy, just a simple skin care routine of washing, toning and moisturising for clearer skin.

I’m sure the girls reading this post would agree that they go through some sort of pain to make themselves look better and sometimes we wish the boys could see it. Perhaps walking in our shoes might be the best way to truly understand what us girls go through. Since the new year is coming around, maybe it might just be a good time to make a resolution to take better care of yourself boys. Like I always say, why be good-looking when you can be better-looking?