blue hairs

June 5, 2005 3:32 PM

Why do old women all have the same curled, shellacked, dandelion puffball hairstyle? It seems no matter what the current style is for younger people, or popular style from their own youth, they end up with that.
posted by pieoverdone to Clothing, Beauty, & Fashion (16 answers total)

I used to watch reruns of perry mason when I was a kid. Seems like all the women in that show had curly perms.
posted by delmoi at 3:45 PM on June 5, 2005

Because hair thins with age and thus they seek to maximize the volume of what's left to better cover their scalps? It's the ladies' equivalent of the comb-over.
posted by amber_dale at 3:50 PM on June 5, 2005

For one thing, long hair or hair that points down supposedly makes old women look older. I have no idea if this is true, but it's common folk wisdom. Hence the short hair that points other directions than down.

Another bit of folk wisdom is that older women are supposed to wear softer colors and have softer angles to their hair so as not to look too harsh -- so even though the hair is short, is still curvy rather than buzzed and pointy.

Third, as amber_dale says, puffy hair covers the scalp better.

And finally, gray hair is coarser and therefore more difficult to style. The setting and tinting, and sometimes perming, make the hair more manageable.

When I have white hair it's going to be spiky as hell.
posted by climalene at 4:00 PM on June 5, 2005

When my hair gets all white I want to be one of those ladies with a long braid down my back. I've already got a start on the cats (well, just two for now). Of course, having a braid presumes either no arthritis or cute young houseboy/girl.
posted by matildaben at 4:06 PM on June 5, 2005

Give amber_dale the gold star, he's exactly right.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 4:07 PM on June 5, 2005

Another bit of folk wisdom is that older women are supposed to wear softer colors and have softer angles to their hair so as not to look too harsh -- so even though the hair is short, is still curvy rather than buzzed and pointy.

60s designer Rudi Gernreich, the erstwhile inventor and promoter of the topless bathing suit--essentially a girdle with suspenders--thought that in the future older peopleshould wear a sort of muu-muu caftan hybrid so as not to disturb the eyes of the young by inadvertently exposing any outline of their bodies.
posted by y2karl at 4:51 PM on June 5, 2005

I have always wondered when women make the transition to a more styled look. Women have exponentially better style than men, so I am sure most know when to make the change.
posted by phewbertie at 4:51 PM on June 5, 2005

Most Latin older women I know just pin it back (as both my grandmothers do) such as in this photo of someones grandmother from Chile.
posted by vacapinta at 5:21 PM on June 5, 2005

Living in Montreal I see a great deal of old women with trendy hair cuts. I have to say that there is nothing more disgusting and confusing as seeing a 60 woman squeezed into tight jeans with a short spiky haircut. I wish that all old women would have curly hair like my grandma.
posted by Napierzaza at 5:28 PM on June 5, 2005

Napierzaza, it is apparently young eyes such as yours that Gernreich wished to protect (thanks, y2karl -- that was fascinating).
posted by climalene at 6:21 PM on June 5, 2005

The reason their hair is sprayed and shellacked to within an inch of its life is that old women with that look only get their hair washed and styled when they make their weekly pilgrimage to the hairdresser. It's a big social event for them. I see three women in their 70s and one in their 80s on a pretty regular basis, and from what they've told me, and what I've seen, I now know that it's a well-known fact that most older women don't touch their hair at all at home, and never run a comb or brush through it. So it gets shampooed, set, styled, and sprayed (the four Ss) once a week, and that's it. As the days of the week go by, the hair may deflate a little from sleeping on it, but it's pretty much still a helmet head by the time the next hairdressing appointment rolls around.

Older women with little blunt cuts, or braids or buns, have to do their hair themselves, and most elderly women either can't be bothered anymore, or have arthritic hands, or can't hold their arms up for lengthy periods to roll it or set it or style it.

It is interesting though, how most elderly women, especially those with thinning hair as amber_date has said, do end up with some variation of that strange hairdo, no matter what the style of their youth was. I've thought about that myself.
posted by iconomy at 6:32 PM on June 5, 2005

I think the blue hair thing has something to do with how your corneas change as you get older. After my great aunt had cataract surgery, she was was shocked by the colors of all sorts of things--including items in her home and wardrobe--since she had been seeing them differently for years. I think the blue wash that old ladies use looks bright white to them, wherease bright white looks like a dingy, muddy yellow. It's like those Reveal incandescent light bulbs, which are coated with a blue filter to make less yellow light.

Can anybody back me up? I did a little googling and found no evidence that I'm right.
posted by armchairsocialist at 7:26 PM on June 5, 2005

My mom's in her 80s, doesn't have that hairstyle, never did. She also got a college degree in her 70s and regularly runs and walks around the Mpls lakes. I'm thinking some folks give up on many things, hair included, or decide they have no options other than to follow the crowd. I'm thankful every day that my family's not like that.
posted by GaelFC at 7:34 PM on June 5, 2005

armchairsocialist, I think the more conventional explanation for the blue hair thing is that it's overcompensation for the tendency of some women's hair to have a yellow tinge once it goes white. (Discussion in hair care forum here, and commercial product usage information here.)

And FYI, I'm a female without (too much) gray hair.
posted by amber_dale at 9:02 PM on June 5, 2005

For one thing, long hair or hair that points down supposedly makes old women look older.

There is a little truth to this, but I think that short hair is so associated with age, at least for me, that long hair on an older woman makes her look hale and young at heart.

There is also a moment for middle aged women, when they are really busy, and they get that middle aged I just want to throw a brush through it for two seconds cut.

I swore never to get that cut. I'll just not brush my hair instead. Or go crew cut. (Though the Chilean style looks very classy.)
posted by jb at 10:55 PM on June 5, 2005

I find the puffball hairstyle funny, and my wife thinks the "wash your hair once a week" thing is silly. Her grandma however still does it, because it's her routine. The weekly trip to the hairdresser is Grandma's social event of the week. That, Bingo, and church. If she doesn't feel well enough to go to Bingo or church so be it, but she will pull her walker out into the snow to get to the hairdresser.

My own mother used to call them "dandelion heads" and would amuse herself in church by blowing gently to see if the hair of the ladies in front of her would gently waft off and settle somewhere to sprout grandmother seeds. I miss my mom. She wouldn't have gone for that cut, and my wife has already sworn never to do the puffball either. Her hair is already much too fine to hold a perm to begin with; any weekly pressing, teasing and spraying would likely damage it beyond repair.
posted by caution live frogs at 6:41 AM on June 6, 2005