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Hairstyles Throughout History: The Georgian Era

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Hairstyles for the period 1750-1900 cover the Georgian era, Regency, and Romantic period hairstyles, as well as Victorian and Edwardian period hairstyles. These Era’s note not only hairstyles on men, women, and children, but also wigs and hats as part of the hairstyles of those times. When plays began being performed, even from Shakespearean times, there were never props, backdrops, or other decorations to show the audience where the play was taking place; the only visual concept was through costumes that helped the audience understand what type of stature the character had, what nationality and religion they were, and even the kind of personality they revealed. Various elements were highlighted via costumes, to include make- up, wigs, shoes, and accessories. Typically, costumes reflected what was fashionable at that time including hairstyles. Interestingly, there have been cases where theatre costumes had an effect on what people wore. Period hairstyles helped depict various times in history and wigs often help display the hairstyles of past eras for theatrical productions. Wigs made of human or horse hair were fashionable during the Georgian era. Notably, when wigs came in different colors, they were dusted with flour for a powdery look. Powdering the hair involves application of a glue-like material followed by adding flour, colored with dyes in colors of gray, white, brown, pink, and blue. Men and women had a preference for an artificial coloring of white back then.

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