The Myths and History of Red Hair: 19th Century Fashion Tips For How To Wear Your Red Hair

Well, so much for this post being a short one. Honestly, I'm not planning this. I have a list of links, and my recollection was that most of the passages I'd came across in these old books and journals were rather short. That clearly isn't the case though. Especially so with this one.

Fortunately this one is a very pleasant read. Some of these 19th century writers had a very charming and conversational style. In fact, this one would make a nice little chapter in a book about red hair. It's from a publication called: Ward and Lock's Home Book (1882), and the passage concerned comes from a section of the work titled "Talks on the Toilet".

The title may sound a little comic to our modern ears, but back then of course the term toilet usually referred to a woman's dressing room. So the section concerns things such as advice on personal grooming and hair care, and is punctuated by quaint little images like this:

I came across a few other nice images in the publication, which I'll share at the end of this. A little reward for all the reading you're about to do. Again though, I thought this was quite a nice read, and I enjoyed reading it myself. I've even tried to keep the formatting true to the original. Hence why the paragraphs begin with a string of capitalised words.

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From 'Talks on the Toilet', on the topic of red hair and how best to wear it.

RED HAIR CLAIMS our attention first for two reasons: 1st, that it always claims the attention first, and 2nd, that it belongs to the classification blonde, which gives us the colours most fashionable at the present day.

ENTER A ROOM in daylight (by artificial light red loses much of its ferocity), where there are women without bonnets or hats, and if there be one of them with bright, unmistakable red hair, she will stand out from the rest with a never-failing prominence which, if she be a pretty woman - and red-haired women have often great beauty of feature, and very often lovely complexions - is of the greatest advantage to her, socially speaking, and, if she is not pretty, an equal disadvantage. Notice a girls' school (ladies' school it is the snobbish fashion of the day to call them !) walking two and two along the road or street, and if there are one or two with red plaits visible at the back or a red fringe apparent in front, the eye picks them out in a moment from the dark-haired and the brown.

RED HAIR IS NOT admired at our end of the nineteenth century, except by the few who have the "courage of their opinions." With the exclusion of a peculiarly vivid orange variety, we give it as our unhesitating opinion that red hair is frequently artistically beautiful, and that it can be treated in two different ways - by similitude or by contrast - with such excellent effect that, could only the possessors of this maligned colour be induced universally to practise these modes of treatment, red hair would soon be as fashionable as it was in 1830, and for some years later. Were the colour more uncommon than it is, red hair would not, probably, need artifice to make it popular. It is usually very plentiful, and is sometimes very soft and fine, but its great disadvantage is that it is too often seen in company with more red hair of a different shade. It is much more difficult to treat it collectively than individually. That is really a clever girl who, with prononcé red hair, manages not only to make it look as picturesque as it ought to look, but contrives to individualize her own particular shade of red.

WHY IT SHOULD BE called "red" is difficult to imagine. Hair is never red. The shades that are called by that name are either yellow or orange.

In 1830 RED hair was so fashionable that possessors of the most magnificent chevelures of chestnut or black dyed these tresses red.

AT THE MEETING of a four-in-hand club that took place not long ago, a red-haired family was liberally scattered over the outside of one of the coaches. The effect of several different shades of yellow and orange was simply desperate. In one case the red was grizzled, gently shading off into the characterless grey that is the last fate of hair of this colour. In another its owner had shown it off to the very greatest disadvantage by wearing a very bright shade of blue in her ribbons. Her intention was good - the result disastrous. Another and younger sister wore a dress almost exactly matching her rosy locks, but brighter instead of paler. She thus rendered her rather pretty colouring pale, faint, and grey. We shall see, as we get on, what these girls ought to have done to render their "family" hair less conspicuous and more becoming.

THERE IS A WARM and lovely tinge of red, that the old masters loved to paint, and which the pre-Raphaelite faction of our own time adore. There are gold lights in it, bronze reflets (there is really no English word for reflets), and hints of brown in the shade. Such hair should always ripple and wave, or it loses half its loveliness. It should catch the light at many different angles, so that, like a diamond or an opal, it may display itself. In the sun, such hair is simply glorious. The Peter Bells of the world (and their name is legion) glance at it, call it red, recollect that red hair is not admired, and think no more of it than their prototype did of the yellow primrose. This shade of red is not common. It is sometimes seen with brown eyes, brown eyelashes, brown eyebrows, brunette colouring. Out of a strong light it is insignificant, and might be called straw-coloured. When it is perfectly straight it is insignificant. It should, therefore, be artificially waved, and arranged in wide, loose plaits. We have, alas! no recipe to offer for obtaining perpetual sunshine in our ile brumeuse, but a woman possessing hair like this may be forgiven if she sits on the lawn in summer without her hat, letting the little sunbeams make the best and the most of her "crown of glory."

THE COMMONER SHADES are more orange than yellow. Eve the worst of these may be cleverly managed in either of the two modes referred to some lines back; viz., by administering a treatment of similitude or one of contrast. "What! wear red with red hair?" someone asks, aghast. No, no; wear yellow, orange, amber, with what is called red hair. Gold - real gold, not gold-coloured ribbons and silks, which have not the true 'gold' shade -deprives red hair of a very large proportion of its aggressive redness. The difficultly is that none of the ornaments used at the present day are suitable in gold; that few persons can afford real gold, and that imitation is not to be thought of; and that bullion, when used decoratively, is nearly always mis-used, i.e., used too liberally, whether in furniture or dress. It appears to be one of those things which, like opium-eating or smoking, cannot be indulged in without excess.

ONCE A GILT chair gets into a drawing-room, more gilt chairs follow it, then a gilt table under the gilt-framed mirror; then comes an ebony and gold piano, an ebony and gold music-stool; and thus the mischief increases, until the eye has no rest from gold and black. It is like a spurious and cheap edition of the progress of King Midas.

A GOLD BAND on red hair has then, an excellent effect. An amber ribbon disposed either in fillets, if the shape of the head be good enough, or in small knots if the arrangement of the hair lends itself to them, will often serve to glorify rather dead-looking hair. The shade of amber must, however, be most judiciously selected. It should be just an idea lighter and brighter than the tint of the hair.

ABOUT SIX YEARS AGO - It became fashionable to wear very small knots of ribbon in the hair. These were composed of a piece of ribbon about two inches wide, and not more than five inches long, twisted round into very small compass. Through these a hairpin was pushed, and the knots were thus fastened into the coiffure. Never was a more becoming "trimming" invented for the head. When judiciously placed, the small knots served to indicate and emphasize the best points of the outline of the head, and when carefully chosen with respect to colour, the effect was excellent from every point of view. Brunettes may wear scarlet, crimson, maize, or dark blue, according to their complexion; blondes choosing pale, lavender, dull, deep reds, or amber.

THIS IS HOW RED hair and some kindred shades may be treated by similitude. We will now see how far the doctrine of contrast applies. There are very few shades that may be ventured upon in juxtaposition with so daring a colour as that called red, when exhibited in the hair. These, too, must be of the very palest. There are soft, nemophila blue, a greenish forget-me-not blue, also a still paler greenish evening-sky-blue, all of which go admirably with the most garish shades of red hair. Pinks and red must be abjured. Very pale lavender has an excellent effect. In the evening, white flowers are charming in red hair, more especially when arranged in sprays. When red hair is wavy, and falls in pretty lines, so as to catch the light becomingly, these colours may be used very sparingly; but when the hair is straight, lank, uninteresting, it may with excellent effect be almost entirely covered with one of the handkerchief caps of soft silk now again in fashion.

WE ONCE NOTICED very red hair tied back with a crimson ribbon. The effect ought to have been terrible; it was, on the contrary, admirable, but then, the wearer was a child of ten, with an exquisite complexion, the soft pearly white tints that accompany red hair so often, with faint pink touches on cheeks and lips, and eyelashes darker than the hair. We do not advise our rousses to try the experiment if they have left behind them the "wild freshness of morning." It would be a little risqué.

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And now the promised pictures.

This first illustration is titled the toilet, so quite literally illustrates what a lady's toilet or dressing room would've commonly looked like back then. The hair of the girl seated is not quite red, but near enough; more a dark chestnut or brown.