John Hoppner. Portrait of a Woman. 1790s. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 06.1242.
As with anything in fashion, there is a transition from one distinct style to the next. The early 1790s was one such transitional period wherein hair continues to be very curly and frizzed, but cushions slowly disappear and styles relax into a more “natural” design.
The use of hair powder begins to decline in the 1790s, but it would be incorrect to assume that hair powder just disappeared from one year to the next. Heideloff’s Gallery of Fashion was still publishing fashion plates showing pomaded and powdered hair from 1794 to 1803. [1] In addition, careful examination of portraits from the mid-1790s show a matte finish to the hair, indicating at least a small amount of powder was still being used, [2] though public sentiment and taxation eventually brought it to an end. To find out more about the demise of hair powder in the 1790s, see here.
In this chapter, we demonstrate a casual, curly ’do using heat-set papillote curls, a popular and historically accurate curling method. You will notice that we powder Zyna’s hair very little, in keeping with the changing laws and fashions of this period. For millinery, we’ve opted for a very simple head wrap, called a chiffonet, [3] made from silk organza, an easy and very period way to decorate your 1790s coiffure.