HAIRSTYLES

FROM CULTURE TO
FASHION STATEMENT
What’s hairdressing?

It’s the art of arranging hair

Hairstyles along history: social
and cultural significance

It’s been a signifier of:

• Class

• Gender

• Ethnicity

• Authority and Power

 General Overview
1
Necessity to cut or confine the
hair to keep it out of the way

2
Personal adornment
3
Status and Age

- Primitive men: fastened bones,

feathers and other objects.
Why ?

Impress and Frighten Enemy

- Noble Rank: long hair.

- Noble Rank after the conquest: short hair
- Boys in ancient Greece cut their hair

- Hindu boys shaved their heads when they

reached adolescence
4
Religious Significance

- the shaved heads of Christian and Buddhist

monks: renunciation of the world;

- England in the 17th century: cropped hair

and long curling locks
5
Last changes in hairstyles

- Influence of fashion
* Changes through the years
* Class
* Today: women and men in all classes
can choose the style and colour of their
own hair, or of a wig

I (always, normally) like to keep my hair short/long

I like to put my hair into a pony tail/twist/pig tails (often, sometimes)
I like it curly/straight/with-without gel
I like my hair to look spiky/soft/unkempt
 History of Hair
From 3000BC to Present
Day

http://www.ukhairdressers.com/history%20of%20hair.asp
 Egypt

• Noblemen and women: hair clipped

close to the head
• Curly black wigs donned for
ceremonial occasions (women’s wigs
were often long and braided,
adorned with gold ornaments)
• Men’s faces: shaved
 Greece

• Women’s hair: long and pulled back

into a chignon (bun). May dyed their
hair red with henna and sprinkled it
with gold powder, often adorning it
with fresh flowers or jewelled tiara’s.
• Men’s hair: short and sometimes
shaved.
 Rome

• Like Greek styles:

- Upper classes: use of curling irons and gold

power. Women often dyed their hair blonde or
wore wigs made from hair of captive civilization
slaves.
- Later: more ornate hairstyles with hair curled tight
and piled high on the head.

Hairdressing: more popular

slaves attended upper classes
public barber shops visits
 The East

• Hair hidden in public:

- Men: turban or fez

- Women’s hair: veil
- Men and women: local public baths
 China

• Unmarried Chinese girls: long hair

• Women: hair combed and tied up into a knot at

the nape.

• Men: front of head shaved

back of head with long and braided hair,
tied with black silk
 Japan

• Males: front of the head shaved

back of head with hair pulled tightly into a
short stiff ponytail.

• Women:
- Medieval period: long and loose
- 17th century: more styled
Swept up from the nape of the neck and adorned
with pins and jewelled combs.

Geisha
 Africa

• Many tribes, so many hairstyles

Easters Tribes: desert
Western Tribes: tropical rainforest
• African Masai
• Mangbetu
• Mursi tribes
America

• Native American Indians from:

– East Coast
– Great Plains
– Central America, Mexico (Aztec)
– Central America, southern
Mexico (Maya)
– Further South (Incas)
The Western World
15th Century (Renaissance
period)

• Upper class ladies

 16th Century

• Queen Elizabeth: set the trends.

– white face powder and red wigs.
 18th Century

• Elaborated wigs, mile-high coiffures

and highly decorated curls.
• White powdered wigs with long
ringlets.
• Big hair
Victorians

• Puritanical line

• Hair
 1920

• Women: more free more

independent. Theatre and Cinema
• Emergence of short, bobbed and
waved styles
• Men’s hair remained short, but using
brilliantine and highly perfumed oils.
 1980

• The “Age of Excess”: more freedom

of choice in styles and trends.
• A good hairdresser was an essential
part of this woman’s life. This
woman’s hairstyle reflected ‘control’,
a busy work life
Modern Hairdressing
Procedure
 What does this show us?
• Different people throughout the world have
different ideas of what beauty is
• One is not necessarily better than the
other
• Your hairstyle is not the only way to look
great

TREAT EVERYONE EQUALLY AND

APPRECIATE DIFFERENCES!
Images taken from http://www.shutterstock.com/