Hairstyles are cyclical. Last year, there was a trend for sharp angles and symmetrically satisfying looks, such as the contoured, escalator bob and the Disney Princess-esque high pony.
Now there has been a move towards a more natural look. A recent article in The Cut has pointed out that there are currently only two types of hairstyle: the up and the down, while Racked noted that the most popular hairdo on American TV (think Cookie in Empire, Jane the Virgin, Olivia Wilde in Vinyl) is flat at the top and feathered at the bottom.
Photograph: Chuck Hodes/AP
So why the movement away from heavily “done” marquee hairdo?
In fashion terms, it has been a long time coming. In the wake of the streetwear wave that has been taking place, more and more designers are streetcasting. And that idea – that authentic, natural beauty is more about attitude than cosmetically based – has been fetishised and has made it on to the catwalk via designers such as Nasir Mazhar, and Demna Gvasalia of Vetements and Balenciaga.
“It’s about being breathing new life into a stuffy world,” says Gary Gill, a hair stylist who has worked closely with both labels for the past few seasons. “The look is about people thinking: ‘I could be that person.’”
On TV, it’s a similar story where the most dominant styles are the normal looking dos of Happy Valley’s Sarah Lancashire and Rebekah Staton in Raised By Wolves. You need to look to Sarah Paulson as Marcia Clark in The People v OJ Simpson to see the most “done” look of the TV season: a tight perm. That show is, tellingly, set in 1994.
TV critic Hannah Verdier says the look straddles a fine line between fabulous and attainable, in the same way that Jennifer Aniston did with The Rachel. “It’s glamorous hair that a real woman could do with a half-hour blowdry (after the gym or before the school run),” she says. “And it’s the sort of do that lasts three days between washes, which gives you plenty of time to get on with more important things.”
Gill says it is reactionary, specifically to the look of the past half decade, which was heavily manicured and well finished. “Now it’s very pared down: loosely tied back with bits falling out. It’s not contrived. It’s about having a decent haircut and letting the natural texture come out,” he says. The process – drying hair with your hands, using dry shampoo, not using combs or brushes – is “more is less” and very #iwokeuplikethis, an interesting pull against life in the Kardashian age.
