“Styling: Historic Hair” at Historic Deerfield, 29 Apr.

Historic Deerfield is hosting a symposium on historic hairdressing and wigs tomorrow, and it’s still possible to register for online viewing by 1:00 P.M. today.

“Styling: Historic Hair and Beauty Practices” explores the visual and material culture of hairdressing in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Atlantic World.

At the start of that period, influential men like the Rev. Increase Mather and Samuel Pepys expressed misgivings about the new fashion for wigs. Eventually wigs for men became de rigueur, a style we have a hard time understanding now. But maybe this one-day forum can help.

The event description says:

For the fashionable, interest in hair and hairdressing became as integral as clothing to the creation of a cosmopolitan appearance. The resulting confections reached new literal and figurative heights in the quest for distinction on both sides of the Atlantic.

Influences on hair and head dressing came from many sources. France was an acknowledged leader in all things à la mode, but other countries also contributed styles, materials, talent, and inspiration to dress the head. As important as appearance was, the question of who had access to the latest news and services of hairdressers and fashion merchants, and who did not, is also noteworthy. By the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, people traditionally marginalized from the dominant fashion conversations nonetheless expressed themselves through hair and inspired others in equally inventive ways.

The presenters are:

• Debbie Turpin, Colonial Williamsburg, “18th Century Wig-Making, From Shaven Head to Style.”
• Philippe Halbert, Yale University, “War Paint and Rouge: Keeping up Appearances in New France.”
• Ned Lazaro, Historic Deerfield, “‘This famous roll’: New England’s Hairstories.”
• Jonathan Michael Square, Parsons School of Design, “Hair, Headwrapping, and Black Beauty Culture.”
• Kimberly Chrisman Campbell, fashion historian, “Poufs and Politics: Women, Hair, and Power in the Reign of Louis XVI.”

For the schedule and registration information, go to this webpage by 1:00 P.M. today