The ‘60s: Hair We Go Again : Fashion: The newest shapes are updated and easier versions of styles from the decade of flower power, geometric chic and teasing.
This summer’s newest hairstyles come straight from the history books--1960s history, that is. Back-combed “bubbles,” wash-and-wear geometrics, and hippie-like, long, straight styles are being reshaped.
At Cristophe and Vidal Sassoon, two top Beverly Hills salons, recent shows featured versions of looks first seen on the pages of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar more than 20 years ago.
In Cristophe’s show, 20-year-old Samantha Klink modeled a blond flip like socialite-actress Dina Merrill wore in the 1960s. Klink’s version had long bangs that almost obscured her heavily made-up eyes. “I look exactly like my mother did in high school,” the model cooed. “She was so cool.”
This particular nostalgia kick has been building for some time. For Guess? jeans ads, model Claudia Schiffer started wearing a ‘60s Bridget Bardot hairstyle more than a year ago. Her messy blond bangs and wispy French twist had an obvious impact. But it was the tousled, piled-up topknot that Ivana Trump wore on the May cover of Vogue that brought the Bardot look mainstream.
Demi Moore’s newest hairstyle for the movie “Ghost” is a short, wispy bubble reminiscent of the boy cut worn by ‘60s model Twiggy. Jodie Foster went ‘60s when she wore a sleek, one-length style--a clone of Barbra Streisand’s post-”Funny Girl” look--to the Academy Awards.
The resurgence of interest in ‘60s fashion has fueled the hair revival. A number of vintage items, including hip-hugger pants, Pucci prints, and Courreges and Rudi Gernreich dresses--all copied by fashion designers today--still look best with the hairstyles that were created for them.
“But it’s more than just the fashion,” explains Cristophe, owner of the Beverly Drive salon. “Look at politics, the current peace movement, the environmental concern. And everyone is fascinated with the music again. The entire decade is back.”
Aitch Peters, senior creative director at the Sassoon salon in Beverly Hills, says that after his recent style show, “dozens of women have come in, talking about ‘60s hairdos and asking for a ‘90s version of the look.” To Peters, the new styles are derivatives of the original wash-and-wears Sassoon popularized in the mid-’60s, but they are “softer, less hard-edged. There’s also more versatility to the cut. Today women want to be able to wear their hair more than one way.”
Long hair allows for the most versatility. At the Cristophe show, blunt-cut shoulder-length hair was swept up into French twists and top-knots, slicked off the face into tight chignons worn at the crown, or worn long and straight, reminiscent of singer-actress Cher when she was still wearing bell-bottoms and singing with her then husband, Sonny Bono. The hair was bone straight.
Says Cristophe, “Right now perms are out, unless they are very soft and only slightly wavy. No more curls.”
Most of the styles shown by Sassoon were short, above-the-chin length cuts. In their original versions, typical geometric cuts from Sassoon looked one way all the time and demanded constant trims to maintain a sharp, well-defined perimeter. “That kind of precision look is not part of this new take on the ‘60s,” says Peters.
Neither is heavy back-combing, or “teasing” as it was called then. Eric Lintermans, owner of Lintermans La Coupe in Beverly Hills, predicts that women won’t tease their hair to achieve the definitive high crown of the 1960s.
Instead, he says, “The fullness is achieved with a cut.” Lintermans adds, “Women have grown accustomed to hair that can be touched. They won’t give that up. In the ‘60s men were afraid to touch a woman’s hair for fear of ruining an expensive hairdo. That won’t work anymore.”
Another hallmark of the ‘60s that doesn’t work now is the roller, which helped to shape bubbles and beehives of the early part of that decade. Today rollers have been replaced by blow-dryers, round hairbrushes and high-tech hair mousses, gels and sprays. These products make it possible to style an updated bubble shape like the one Kenneth, New York’s king of hair creations in the ‘60s, designed (without rollers) in 1961 for First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.
Likewise, those who want the ultra-straight looks of the later ‘60s won’t have to resort to pressing their long hair on ironing boards. Wide, flat brushes and gels and sprays that straighten as well as mold hair into shape, produce the look now.
With the return of ‘60s hairdos comes a resurgence in interest in hairpieces. Falls and postiches (shorter than a fall and used to add fullness) positioned high on the crown give the extra height that defined many of the most popular teased styles 25 years ago. They are worn with wide headbands, reminiscent of those Elizabeth Taylor wore when she was being courted by Richard Burton. At the Cristophe show one model wore a short postiche topped with another that was shaped into a wide bow of hair that hinted of the past, yet looked thoroughly modern.
If the current homage to ‘60s hair doesn’t quite work, it is because stylists are attempting to compress all the hairdos of the decade into the trend. In their day, these styles represented several mini fashion revolutions, and the time span between each new look was in keeping with the changes in fashion and, more importantly, society.
A bubble was right for the Camelot days of the early ‘60s, Sassoon’s geometrics were in keeping with the mod mood of ‘64, and long, shapeless looks were suited to the flower children of the latter part of the decade. But taken out of context, these styles become a humorous collage, destined to be a short-lived fad rather than a revolution. Like most retro looks, they may be a means of biding time until a truly new style emerges. As Lintermans, who has been styling hair since the early ‘60s points out, “I can’t believe that women will be serious about these looks. It’s fun for now.”
