Historical Hair: The Little Dorrit Wedding Hairstyle Tutorial!!

Dear Bloggeresses Who Have Hair and Love Period Dramas and Have Been Waiting An Age For Another Tutorial:

Here is the moment you've been waiting for!!! Yes, I know I did a whole big "There will be lots of new tutorials on this blog and which ones do you want?!" You may have been wondering if all my sisters-who-act-as-my-models-and-victims had contracted Scarlet Fever and lost all their hair. ;) But truly, I have had no time to dabble in fun historical-hair styling this summer. Until today.

Eeep! I had to let that out because this style turned out so amazingly more beautiful than I imagined, and that's a bit of an exciting event to a girl who loves to succeed in her hair-ventures. :D So with great pleasure I introduce: "The Little Dorrit Wedding Hairstyle Tutorial". As usual I will illustrate the direction with pictures that I hope are pretty clear. :)

We begin.

Step One:

Curl the hair. Usually I would set the hair in bandana waves (which I explained how to do here) but in interest of time I used a curling iron. Ahem. :P The front of this hairstyle is supposed to be loose and a little wavy, so I just curled a bit of Sarah's front hair to get some volume and wave going. After you curl the hair, or take it out of the bandanas, finger through the curls.

Step Two:

Gently French-braid the hair on one side of the head, until you get to the back. Clip in place temporarily while you work on the other side. :)

Sarah's hair on the left side, and below you will see it on the right side. And look at those lovely sun-kissed streaks! That, dear ladies, is not something that you can get with a chemical dye! That's called one of the bonuses of spending your life out in the garden! :D

Step Three:Finger through the French-braids, loosening the pieces of it and making it pouf a little. :) See? At this point both sides are clipped back temporarily so you can arrange the front. :)

Another shot where she was playing dramatic "hair-model"... :D

Step Four:

This may be the trickiest part of the style, merely because it would be nice to have an extra hand holding all this hair. :) But all you have to do is unclip the French-braids, gather them into your hand with the left-over hair, and make a short, regular braid. Pull the braid a little bit toward the left side so that it falls a bit over your shoulder.

You can see it more from the left side below...

Step Five:

As hair-bands are entirely *un*historic, you may take a section of the hair beneath the band and wrap the strand around the hair-band, and pin it in place, or tie it in a loose knot, if that's more convenient. :)

Step Six:

Using small pieces, curl the ends of the hair with a curling iron. I alternated curling the hair under and over so that the curls would look interesting. :) If your hair doesn't take kindly to staying curled, spray some hair-goo over it. :)

Step Seven:

Add some flowers down the left side, and a couple near the bottom of the braid. :) I used the sweetest little red rosebuds with charming effect. :)

And voila! You have completed the not-so-complicated Little Dorrit Wedding Hairstyle!! :) Here are some of the "Victory-shots" ;)

(Next time I would like the hair a little wavier, and perhaps a bit more French in the French-braid, but it's still lovely. :)

*GAH!* Isn't it simply beautiful?!? I was surprised at how gorgeous it turned out! Especially with the red roses. :) This style is perfect for a 1800's ball, a wedding, or any other special occasion when some timeless elegance is required! :) I hope you enjoyed this hair-tutorial, and that you found the directions clear enough. Tell me what you think? Do you have any suggestions for following historical-hair tutorials? And as always, would you like me to do more of these how-tos?

~Rachel

Historical Hair Tutorial Poll

I am thinking of doing more hairstyle tutorials, and I wanted your opinions- quicker than a poll would get them! :D So here we go- Tell me which hairstyle you'd like to see a tutorial for:

The Sweetheart Twist (No image yet, because I made it up! [Abigail, I did this to you on Sunday] :P)

The Anne Shirley Pompadour

Amy Dorrit's Wedding Hairstyle (the actress's bangs are a little funky- I'd probably change that)

Amy March's "Abroad" Chignon
(Sorry I couldn't find any closer pictures!)

Lady Dedlock's Aristocratic Up-do :)

Other Original Styles :)

So just let me know which one you would like me to figure out and do! :) ~Rachel

Historical Hair: The Belle Gardiner Ball Coiffure

So here is the second historical hairstyle tutorial. Leah agreed to let me do her hair in this gorgeous style...thanks Leah! :)
The difficulty level of this style is a little harder than the Ada Clare Pull-Back, simply because you begin with straight hair, and mistakes are more easily seen. Remember, this is the style I have come up with from this picture from the movie. I know it is not exactly like the movie. But this is one version of a hairstyle inspired by and similar to Belle Gardiner's movie coiffure. I may try again sometime and try to watch it over and get the exact style, but anyway, to begin! :)

Step One: Brush out hair

Step Two: Pull hair smoothly and gently over ears, so that is looks smooth and flat over the ears from the front. The essence of the Civil War hairstyles. Pin in place.

Step Three: Starting below the right ear, very gently begin French-braiding the hair, keeping it loose so that the hair will still lie flat over the ears. Braid along back of head and over to left side.

Try to keep the braid inconspicuous. It is not the focal point of the hairstyle.

Step Four: Hold the braid loosely in one hand, and take out a strand of hair near the middle of the back of the head for a curl. Take another strand or two to curl and hang over the shoulder. Braid the remaining hair into a long braid, and coil into a bun. Pin in place.

hee-hee...you can see I was double-dutying on the hair thing...there's Sarah with her hair in bandanna waves! :P

I also kept the coiling of the braid loose. This is not supposed to be a very tight style as far as the braiding goes, so a meticulously braided and coiled bun would be out of place.


A side view

Another side view. You can see the way the hair is pulled softly over the ears.

Step Five: Curl the strands of hair left out and arrange as you like. I left one curl hanging down Leah's back, and two over her shoulder. In the original hairstyle in the movie, Belle Gardiner's curls were very tight and small ringlets. However, my curling iron is sort of fat and would not make a small ringlet. You may wish to set the strands of hair in sponge curlers to get that effect. Also, the shorter your hair, the smaller the ringlets will be.

Step Six: I put a comb into the hair, above the braided bun. This is how Belle Gardiner had her's in the movie, as far as I can tell. Her comb was much larger than mine, though.

Here are the final pictures! :)



I could have wrapped her curl once or twice around her bun to make it shorter, but I chose to leave it longer and looser.




So there you go! Complete instructions for the Belle Gardiner Ball Coiffure- as far as I could get it right! :) Tell me what you think! ~Rachel

Historical Hair: The Ada Clare Pull-Back Tutorial

Per the votes so far on the polls, I have figured out and taken step by step pictures of two historical hairstyles: The Ada Clare Pull-Back, and The Belle Gardiner Coiffure. Please realize that these are the versions I came up with- I am not saying they are identical to the styles worn by the characters in the movies, but they are as similar as I could get them to be with the limited views I had of the styles. (Try getting a scene in Bleak House light enough to see the back of Ada's hair! :D)
So without further ado, I present the first of, I hope, many tutorials: The Ada Clare Pull-Back! :)


Step One: Set hair in Bandanna Waves- inspiration courtesy of Rapunzel's Resource
These waves give hair the perfect volume and texture for many of the early to mid-eighteen-hundreds styles. I started by spraying Sarah' hair with water and combing it out.

Then I rolled up three bandannas, lengthwise. Not tip to tip.

I separated her hair into thirds, and then twisted the sections around the bandannas that I had folded in half (once more, lengthwise) in a figure-eight fashion, securing the ends with hair bands.
She slept in these overnight, much to Gracie's delight, who told her she "looks like a mooser" (moose) You can actually see Gracie cracking up in the background.



Step Two: In the morning, unravel the hair and finger through it: I combed the top of her hair to smooth it out a little, because it was fuzzy from overnight.

You will see Sarah in a different shirt in a minute- I asked her to change so that the hairstyle would show to better effect! :)

Step Three: Gently pull back hair from face, letting the curls fall gently over the ears. The idea in this style is a soft effect. Do not stretch the curls, do not worry about it being a little poufy. In fact, you want that look. Just coax the hair back and pin with bobby pins.

See, she is visiting the bloggy world while I slave over her hair! ;)

You want the front and top part of the hair to look like loose waves. I wasn't happy with one side, so I took the curling iron and crimped the top a little to make it wavier. Next time I hope to start the bandanna waves a little higher on her head to get more volume at the roots. Here is a side-view of this step:
At this point in the style, you could just stop and put a clip or comb over the bobby pins. This style is more of the "Young Ada" and is very pretty too.

Step Four: Gather the rest of the hair into your hand. Leave out two sections, as thick as you would like them to be for the side curls, one on either side of where the coiffure will be. Very gently twist into a coiffure or very loose bun. Again, leave the curls and waves to fall softly where they will. Pin in place with hairpins. My camera would not focus as well as I wished it to. In these pictures the bun looks rather messy, but it was very pretty in real life :)




Step Five: Now you will curl the side-curls. Depending on how well your bandanna waves set up, you may not need to use a curling iron. I wanted to get ringlets though, so I dampened the sections I had left out so that I could re-curl them, using the iron. I ended up splitting each section in half and making two curls out of it, then finger-combing through them so that they would be looser and join. The idea is to make it look natural, not set in stone! :)


Step Six: The style is now technically finished. Play around with the hair, add more pins if the bun is slipping, and fix the side-curls to your taste. Spray style in place, if desired.
At this point you may add a comb above the bun, but I preferred leaving the style natural. Actually this would be a really sweet style to use fresh flowers in. A wild rose or two would look beautiful tucked by the side of the bun :)

So there you have it: The Ada Clare Pull-Back. It is not a hard style, and it is absolutely beautiful! The more it relaxes, the prettier it looks, which is a plus: who wants to work on a hairstyle and have it last only an hour? :) Thank you Sarah for being patient with me and making a loverly model! ;)

Please leave a comment and tell me what you think, and if you think I ought to make tutorials a regular thing :) ~Rachel

Historical Hair...the inspiration behind a new idea...

I thought that it would be a fun idea to do some hair-style tutorials on this blog, since I have had plenty of practice with 5 younger sisters! :) I love doing unusual and pretty hairstyles, and of course some of the best are historically inspired! :) For a long time I have been wanting to figure out some particular hairstyles from period movies, so I will be working on those. But I wanted to know which ones you girls would like me to figure out and do tutorials on. Here are the choices. You can vote on the sidebar for your favorites and I'll do my utmost best to figure them out! :)

Belle Gardiner's hairstyle for the ball (and this was the single picture I could find of it- I'm sorry!)

Anne's Shirley's classic Gibson-girl pompadour....

Ada Clare's (Bleak House) sweet hairstyle- so pretty for a young girl!

I really like this hairstyle of Harriet Smith's in the 2009 Emma. All her other hair-days are horrible, but this one is actually really cute! :)

I guess Barbara Spooner's hair (Amazing Grace) is slightly too ambitious at this point, isn't it? Not to mention I'd be hard-pressed to find a girl with enough hair to be the model! :)

Well, go ahead and vote! :) ~Rachel