It has always been a double-turreted wonder to me why romancers are
forever harping about heroines with "tresses in artistic disarray." All
the tresses in such condition that I have ever gazed upon have looked
most slovenly and ofttimes positively waggish. How any one can think
that a girl with a tangled braid hanging down her back, a little wad
over one ear, a ragged, jagged fringe edging its way into her eyes and
half a dozen little wisps standing out here and there in haystack
fashion--how one can even fancy that such a head as that is pretty is
more than I can explain. Clothes may make the man, but rational
hairdressing goes a pretty long way toward making the woman. Observe my
lady in curl-papers and my lady togged up for a dinner party. Comment
is unnecessary, for you have all seen her--or yourselves, which is
quite the same thing.
Those fortunate women to whom straight hair is becoming should never
indulge in curls. There is nothing prettier than hair drawn loosely
away from the face. It leaves displayed those lovely lines on the
temples about which artists and poets go mad. As to the style of
dressing one's hair, that must be left solely to one's taste. If the
lines of the head, the shape of the face and the hair itself are
studied a bit the solution of the most becoming coiffure is very easily
solved.
A head that looks like a wax image in a hairdresser's window is
certainly anything but pretty. Neither is it artistic, for the
correctly crimped and waved side-locks are too mechanically planned to
look at all natural. To nearly all women the plainer the mode of
hairdressing the more becoming it is. That does not mean that you
should comb your hair straight back and wad it into a funny little
bump. Quite the contrary. Comb it back if you will, but have the coil
loose and graceful. It is very bad for the hair either to be pulled
back tightly or to be closely arranged. Ventilation is necessary, and,
by the way, caressing and smoothing the hair with the fingers is a good
tonic for its growth and beauty.
A few loose short curls about the face seem necessary to the good looks
of the majority of women, but the heavy bang was shelved years ago.
Wasn't it hideous? But perhaps you are too young to remember. Get out
the family album, then, and see for yourself.
[Illustration: MRS. JOHN JACOB ASTOR]
There are certain rules for hairdressing that were just as good in
Eve's hairpinless age as they will be a hundred years hence. By keeping
these rules in mind you can make a picture or a cartoon of yourself,
just as you wish. The one thing to remember is that the lines and
proportions of the face must be carefully considered and a mode of
hairdressing adopted which will lessen and not exaggerate those lines
and proportions. Be alert to your defects, and do not forget that what
may be essentially appropriate for one woman will be dismally
inappropriate for another.
Suppose a woman has a square, heavy jaw. She is just the one who flings
defiance at prevailing fashions and clings to the dear old straight
bangs deep over her eyes. The heavy chin makes a straight line, the
heavy fringe makes another, and the result is that her face is as
perfectly square as rules and measurements could make it. Let this
deluded lady shake herself together and mend her ways. By making the
top of her head appear wider the broad jaws will--according to all laws
of reasoning--seem to be narrower. A few dainty puffs towering up
prettily and a soft, fluffy fringe left flying out over the ears will
not only add grace to the forehead but lighten the heaviness of the
lower part of the face. A bow of ribbon or any other perky little
headdress will detract from the straight cross lines.
Then there is the woman with the sharp chin, the woman of the
wedge-shaped face. She invariably wears her hair over her ears and so
elongates the V lines of her chin. By arranging the hair close to the
sides of her head and putting it in a soft low coil on the top a much
more pleasing effect can be got.
The same rule for the heavy-chinned woman applies to the chubby,
fat-faced feminine mortal. The "roly-poly" visage looks less
"roly-poly" when the front hair is drawn back and up in pompadour style
and the long tresses piled into a nice little tower. The pompadour mode
of hairdressing also holds good with the girl whose eyes are set too
high. This helps along the old-time idea that the eyes of a woman
should be in the middle of her head--that is, that they must be set
midway between the bottom of the chin and the top of the hair.
For the women with eyes set too low an exactly opposite arrangement
should be adopted. Instead of drawing the hair away from the face,
bring it down to it. Part the hair and let it come low on the temples
and brow.
I have never seen anything or anybody look much funnier than does a
woman with a sharp-pointed nose and a pysche knot. The nose bumps out
in the front and the wad of hair sticks out in the back with a
similarity that is positively convulsing to any one with half an eye
for the humorous. It gives one an idiotic longing to take a measuring
rule and find out the exact distance from "tip to tip." Another waggish
picture is made by the snub-nosed girl with her hair arranged a la
Madonna. These long hirsute lamberquins on either side of her face make
the poor little nose appear even smaller, like unto a wee dab of putty
or a diminutive biscuit.
Don't caricature your facial defects. Don't get the lines of your head
and face "out of drawing." Don't twist your hair up after every new
fashion that chances to come along. Study the contour of your head from
every side and then adopt that style of hairdressing which at once
brings out the good points and conceals the bad ones. The most becoming
coiffure is the one that gives the most artistic balance to the face.
What will do for the fat, dumpy Miss Plump will make a human joke out
of the lank, willowy Miss Slender.