Hair fashions when you were at school

[Cloo]

I started secondary in 1989 - it was at the tail-end of corkscrew perms for girls and gelled spikes for boys.

Funnily enough, I can't think of any definitive girls' styles that were in fashion for the rest of the time, as I supposed it was just 'long' and I can't remember everyone tending to wear it a certain way. I guess mid-90s there was a spate of unfortunate henna dyeing that tended to turn blondes a crap pinky colour.

However, with the early 90s, a lot of boys grew out their hair and went for the 'curtains' look, which by 6th form (or Years 12 and 13 as no one called it at the time) had mutated into the undercut.

What was in at your school? Or was follicular self-expression ruthlessly surpressed?

 

[scifisam]

Definitely perms for the girls and either spikes or curtains for the boys. It was very rare to see anything else.

 

[moose]

My school was all girls, and hair had to be short and sensible, or tied up. Babylis released their first crimpers when I was about 13, so I had huge ginger crimped hair. When punk came along, some of us shaved the sides to we could put up a mohican at weekends, but have it in bunches at school.

Here's a school photo from 1980, when we were allowed to unleash our hair as it was a special occasion, and there was a frenzy of styling in the cloakrooms at dinner time. Spot me

 

[weepiper]

An obvious class division for both - the poor kids: girls had an incredibly tight scraped high ponytail in a pineapple-head stylee and boys had short gelled spikes. The rich kids: girls had poodle perms and boys had floppy curtains.

 

[boohoo]

I was going to mention the pulled off your face look. There was also the post princess di short hairstyle.

 

[Shirl]

I was at grammar school in the early 60's. I had a huge backcombed beehive for much of the time. By the time I left school my hair was dyed very red and had a bouffant at the front with curls down the back. Another girl had her natural blonde hair bleached white at the front and she regularly got sent home for dyeing the white bit blue or pink with food dye. A couple of other girls had hair like mine but the rest mostly had plaits or bobs all in their natural colour, apart from one very cool girl who had an amazing asymmetric cut that was way ahead of it's time, it was in Burnley anyway

 

[Shirl]

My school was all girls, and hair had to be short and sensible, or tied up. Babylis released their first crimpers when I was about 13, so I had huge ginger crimped hair. When punk came along, some of us shaved the sides to we could put up a mohican at weekends, but have it in bunches at school.

Here's a school photo from 1980, when we were allowed to unleash our hair as it was a special occasion, and there was a frenzy of styling in the cloakrooms at dinner time. Spot me
View attachment 18462

Second row third from the left

 

[Voley]

Spot me
View attachment 18462

Took me about three seconds.

 

[felixthecat]

Those wedge 'Purdy' bobs. Fucking hated that hairstyle.

 

[Geri]

Looking at my school photo, the two girls who were prefects had long hair, the others have a variety of flicked hair, and frizzy hair with no particular style. Mine was the latter, although I am not in the photo. I looked terrible in my mid teens, skinny with frizzy hair and too ashamed to wear my specs, as that would have made me look even worse.

 

[Corax]

The undercut was ubiquitous at my school for a good year or so. A truly hideous invention, that I sported so proudly.

 

[bi0boy]

I had an undercut, it was well 90s.

 

[izz]

what is this undercut of which you speak ? By the 90s I was in a job with a perm.

 

[Orang Utan]

i was in high school from 1986-1991 and i recall perms on lads (esp soccerball fans)
i remember fanny partings as well.
a perm was usually accompanied by a black bomber jacket with a panther on the back and orange lining.

 

[Orang Utan]

ooh, i had a rat-tail when i was a lot younger too

 

[Voley]

It was the 80's when I was at school. Hair was universally enormous.

 

[Yelkcub]

'The step'

 

[QueenOfGoths]

Page boy when I was and junior school, the Princess Di when I was at 'big' school, then the Morrissey Or in my case just a bit shit!

 

[spanglechick]

xmas 89

vestiges of the perm trend, bouffy sideswept fringes with loads of hairspray... and crimped rawk hair.

summer '92

less hairspray. and bloody hell, i still can't make my fringe lie across my forhead without separating into clumps.

 

[kittyP]

A lot of scrunchies.
For some reason they make me feel sick now

 

[Steel Icarus]

Yeah, big perms for the girls, wet-look or that slightly-poodle-like type. And for the fellas - or at least those fellas that were "with-it", mullets or sometimes a neck perm COMBINED with a layered side parting were the thing. Dreadful

 

[May Kasahara]

Girls at my school were either 'pineapples' or 'goffs' The former sported gel perms, bleached or otherwise, with an enormous gelled tidal wave fringe. The latter opted for bad henna jobs, hair wraps, long long long, messy. There were a couple of rogue mullets.

The boy equivalent was gel spikes vs curtains.

 

[Yu_Gi_Oh]

Lots of the girls at my school (in the nineties) had their hair scraped back and held with one of those huge butterfly clips, or piled up pineapple style on the top of their heads. Some of the older girls in our school had those brutal perms still. Most of the boys in our class has very short hair, all over the same length, done with clippers.

I had hair about two inches long because my mother was insane and lived for making me a target.

 

[Miss Caphat]

I was at grammar school in the early 60's. I had a huge backcombed beehive for much of the time. By the time I left school my hair was dyed very red and had a bouffant at the front with curls down the back. Another girl had her natural blonde hair bleached white at the front and she regularly got sent home for dyeing the white bit blue or pink with food dye. A couple of other girls had hair like mine but the rest mostly had plaits or bobs all in their natural colour, apart from one very cool girl who had an amazing asymmetric cut that was way ahead of it's time, it was in Burnley anyway

that all sounds excellent

 

[Ax^]

only remember the hair in secondary school

guys with curtains was the big thing whilst my time in school


never understood it.. but then again it was the 90's

oh and the Chelsea/Croydon facelift hairstyle on almost all the girls

 

[skyscraper101]

I must have used incredible amounts of gel when I was a teen and kept my hair short because I hated the way it went wavy.

I use hair irons these days

 

[such and such]

I was in high school from the mid to late 90s. Lots of boys had undercuts at the start and then a lot of them did the shaved all over thing. Girls I can't remember, generally long and layered I think? The cool girls dyed their hair black or burgundy, quite a few other girls abused their hair with Sun In. Around 98 I got it cut short ala Natalie Imbruglia at the time but was one of the few girls in my school with short hair at the time.

 

[such and such]

Oh yeah and and for about a year a number of girls wore those teeny glittery butterfly clips in their hair.

 

[Greebo]

Oh yeah and and for about a year a number of girls wore those teeny glittery butterfly clips in their hair.

One of my most neurotic landladies did that!

Sorry where were we? Oh yes, hair fashions while at school... There was the wedge, the Di *shudder*, the short multi-layered cut with quiff or fringe styled in umpteen directions, and enormous hair for girls. For boys, there was the rat's tail, the mullet (with or without quiff), and the wedge.

 

[Ax^]

I must have used incredible amounts of gel when I was a teen and kept my hair short because I hated the way it went wavy.

I use hair irons these days

use leave in conditioner and stop being a tart

unless of course you have afro hair