Celebrity Calum Best has had six hair transplants, and he’s not been afraid to speak openly about his experience. He was inspired to take action to improve his hair shedding after seeing photos of Wayne Rooney’s hair transplant 12 years ago.
Since then, he’s been an advocate for hair restoration surgery and has inspired others to tackle male pattern hair loss in return. Speaking about his most recent transplant, Best commented,
“I feel so much better about myself. If science can sort out a problem, why not use it if it is going to improve your mental health and put a smile on your face?”
In this article, you’ll discover:
Calum Best is a model and TV personality born in San Jose, California in 1981. As the son of famous Northern Irish footballer George Best and English model Angie Best, Calum gained a firm place in the UK limelight when he moved to the UK at 21.
He has featured in reality TV programmes including Celebrity Love Island, Celebrity Big Brother, and Ex on the Beach. In addition to his reality TV career, Calum has launched a fragrance line and been involved in several modelling campaigns.
Over the years, Best has become popular for speaking openly about his personal life and challenges with his father’s alcohol addiction. He’s been involved in charity initiatives supporting children with alcoholic parents and is a well-known advocate for mental health.
Calum has had a whopping total of six hair transplants. That’s an unusually high number of hair restoration surgeries, but Best had his reasons.
Firstly, he’s struggled with aggressive hair loss. While hair transplants are permanent and all his transplanted hair has continued to grow, he’s continued to lose more of his natural hair after each transplant.
Secondly, Calum’s looks are an important part of his career. When asked about his multiple surgeries, Best commented,
“Yes, it sounds a little extreme to have so many treatments, but my looks are a huge part of my brand and all the work has been a big help professionally over the last 20 years.”
Calum’s androgenetic alopecia (male pattern baldness) and his multiple transplants have led to many changes to his hairline. Here are some of the changes over the years.
By 2009, when Best was just 28 years old, he was already showing significant male pattern baldness. Above, he has an M-shaped hairline and has buzzed his hair short, but areas of hair loss are still visible.
2011 was before Calum’s first hair transplant, but his hairline is looking healthier here. It may be that longer hair helped disguise his hair loss, and the lighting doesn’t highlight the contrast between his hair and scalp. Alternatively he may have used products like hair thickening shampoo to improve his appearance without surgery.
Just before his first hair transplant, Calum’s temple hair loss was clearly visible. But after 2012, things started to change.
This image shows Best after two hair transplants, just before his third hair transplant in 2015. His hairline has changed significantly, looking much straighter and less recessed. But he’s still lacking some hair along the frontal hairline, hence the third transplant.
After his 2015 transplant, Calum had a smoother, more natural-looking hairline, with hair that was more evenly distributed around the front of his scalp. But hair loss soon struck again and he had a fourth transplant just one year later, in 2017.
Calum’s 2017 transplant lasted well for a few years, and he waited until 2021 to have further surgery. Here, in 2020, it was still holding up well and his hair looked natural with a very mildly receding hairline.
By 2022, a year after his fifth transplant, Best appeared to have a slightly M-shaped hairline again. At this point, he was running out of donor areas on his scalp to harvest hair for new transplants.
Fast forward to 2024, and Calum’s hairline is looking its best in years. He had a sixth transplant in 2023 using grafts from his neck due to a shortage of donor hair on his scalp, giving him a mature, natural-looking hairline.
Calum’s most recent transplant in 2023 was a follicular unit extraction (FUE) hair transplant. His earlier procedures were likely all FUE too, because he doesn’t appear to have visible scalp scarring. Follicular unit transplantation (FUT), the other main type of hair transplant, leaves a strip scar which is often noticeable if you wear your hair short like Calum.
The diagram above shows how FUE hair transplants usually work. However, Best’s sixth procedure was a transplant with a difference — hair was harvested from the beard area on his neck as well as the back of his head. After five previous transplants, taking further hair from the back of his head would thin it out too much.
During Calum’s most recent transplant, his surgeon did some more work on his hairline and filled out areas behind his hairline where he was losing more natural hair. He had 2000 grafts transplanted from his beard area to his scalp, which equals around 3800 individual hairs.
Around 1450 grafts were harvested from the back and sides of Best’s scalp, and an additional 550 grafts came from just below his jawline. Experts said Calum was particularly suitable for a beard-to-scalp transplant because his beard was like a “rug”.
Beard-to-scalp hair transplants are not usually the first choice of hair transplant type, and there are some limitations — learn more about this below.
According to Dr Parsa Mohebi, a hair transplant surgeon based in Beverly Hills, beard-to-scalp transplants aren’t always suitable because of the differences between beard and scalp hair. Beard hair is usually thicker, kinkier, and has less follicles per follicular unit than scalp hair.
Beard follicular units usually contain 1-2 follicles, while scalp follicular units typically have 3-4. Also, beard-to-scalp transplants are only possible for men who have a good amount of healthy beard growth. Some men struggle to grow a beard or experience beard hair loss, and would therefore not be good candidates.
Fortunately, you still have options if you’re short of donor hair on the scalp and aren’t suitable for a beard-to-scalp transplant. Alternative hair growth treatments include low-level laser therapy, PRP hair treatment, and medications such as topical Minoxidil.
It’s unclear exactly how much Calum paid for his six hair transplants, but we can estimate. According to The Sun, his first three transplants cost £25,000 in total, which included transplantation of over 6000 hairs.
He may have, therefore, paid £50,000 or more for his six hair transplants in total. On the other hand, his total may have been less because one of these was performed in Turkey, and hair transplant costs in Turkey are often lower.
According to this breakdown of UK hair transplant costs, Calum paid above the average price for his transplants. This is no surprise because he’s a celebrity and likely earns well above the average income. His looks are an important part of his career, and he was willing to invest in them. He also had more than the average number of grafts transplanted for each procedure.
Calum’s hairline appeared to improve between 2007 and 2011 despite having no hair transplants during this time. One reason for this may be his hairstyle — with a shaved head in 2007, his areas of hair thinning were very easily visible. By growing his hair longer over the following years, he had more scope to style his hair in a way that improved his appearance.
He may also have used products such as hair thickening spray to create the impression of greater density, or hair growth shampoos to reduce shedding and encourage regrowth. Some of these shampoos contain ingredients like ketoconazole for hair loss, which shows promising results in some studies [1].
Best has recently spoken about his decision not to use hair loss medications to slow down his hair loss. Both Minoxidil [2] and Finasteride [3] have been proven to slow hair loss from androgenetic alopecia, but they can come with side effects.
Calum commented, “I am very conscious of what I put in my body. I have been fighting my hair loss for the past two decades and I know lots of guys in their forties and fifties trying to save their hair and they are taking Finasteride. It’s just not for me. ”
Want to know more about celebrity hair transplants and their results? Check out these other A-listers who may have had hair restoration surgery:
If you’re considering a transplant to restore your hair, our expert team at the Wimpole Clinic can help. With knowledgeable trichologists and some of the best hair transplant surgeons in the UK, you’ll receive world-class treatment.
First, your hair doctor will perform diagnostic trichology tests to identify the reason your hair is falling out. They’ll then let you know whether you’re a good candidate for a natural-looking hair transplant and work with you to create a tailored treatment plan.
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