Fashion 87 : Hair Styles Are Remakes of ‘40s, ‘50s Screen Gems

If hair styles carry a social message--feminism, look out.

The new word is hindsight--from smooth blankets of Veronica Lake locks to what the Sassoon people call “less aggressive” hair. The salon uses a Marilyn Monroe look-alike in photos that clinch a sex kitten message.

“We’re right in the middle of this gorgeous hair thing,” pronounces New York modeling agent Eileen Ford. “We’ve all grown our hair, and I don’t see anyone asking for short hair.”

L.A. talent agent Nina Blanchard concurs that spikes, androgyny or anything too assertive is out for models. “For ads, they really seem to want to go back to the more classic beauty.”

But adapting to this ultra-feminine mood can mean grasping such esoteric terms as multitexture angle perms, skip perms, crimping and scissor slicing.

The goal is a square, bell or wide-oval shape do, with curl and volume at sides and bottom--or any style that speaks of a screen-gems glamour, circa ‘40s and ‘50s.

“What we’re going to see this summer is a lot of Liz Taylors and Monty Clifts from ‘A Place in the Sun,’ ” says Vidal Sassoon Salons artistic director Steven Docherty. “Small waists on girls, big shoulders on guys. Little flicky curls. I saw the movie last week, and the next day I had my hair all cut off. Like Monty.”

Silver screen platinum blonds are also making rounds in street fashion, although the shelf life of the fad is up for debate.

“That bleached-out look, the dark brows--it looks so old-fashioned suddenly,” says Ford, who isn’t advising models to emulate Madonna. Even actress Brigitte Nielsen, who’s been wearing inch-long platinum hair, is growing hers out and dying it red, reports stylist Umberto Savone of the Umberto Salon in Beverly Hills, where Nielsen is a client.

With so much hair styling borrowed from the past, the biggest innovations will be in manipulating texture--with perms using irregular-size rods, and with pomades and gels that separate waves.

Sebastian International, which lately promotes a long wild hairdo called “romantic chaos,” likes the idea of “sensual, drippy hair--a feeling like you haven’t washed it in a month,” says Geri Cuzensa, creative director of the Woodland Hills firm. Later this summer, Sebastian comes out with a heavy gel called Mud, for the prescribed effect.

“In fashion, everything is stretch for fall. I wanted to take that to the hair, to make hair feel both rubbery and sensual,” Cuzensa says.

“Some new genius haircut is not going to be popping out of the walls right now,” adds salon owner Allen Edwards of Beverly Hills, who sees this as a season of familiar cuts and new styling tricks--among them: putting away the blow dryer.

One technique Edwards mentions in lieu of the dryer is to drip-dry long hair using styling gel or lotion, with combs and jaw clips clamping hair into waves. Crimpers or large-angle rollers create curl at the ends.

“Comb hair almost flat to the head in waves--those big soft waves that fluff over the face. Then you mess up the wave to make it more casual,” advises Honolulu stylist Paul Mitchell, partner in Beverly Hills-based John Paul Mitchell Systems, producer of hair products.

In short hair, crowns also will be worn flatter--whether it be the kind of chiseled, cropped hair favored by model Isabella Rossellini, or more softly layered styles recalling Monroe.

The New York-based hair products firm L’Oreal suggests a chin-level bob as the optimum length for fall--either curled and coiffed, like their spokesperson Cybill Shepherd, or more casually drip-dried and rippled. It’s the length that best complements the move toward shorter skirts, according to James Viera, L’Oreal vice president.

“As we’re getting into miniskirts, that kind of severe, tight look needs the softness of longer hair to counterbalance the clothes,” Viera says.

But others assert that fall’s shorter hemlines require a more “tailored glamour” in hair. Witness the slick chignons that ruled fashion runways at the recent New York and European fall shows.

In fact, the logic of matching hair length to fashion varies with the year and with who’s talking.

“You could make a case for long hair or short hair with the same silhouette, and it would sound terribly sensible,” Blanchard admits. “It’s just how we keep all of us in business.”