Tag: Facial hair

Now that you have grown that beard or moustache for Movember, take the advice of a couple of barbers on how to keep it smart throughout Decembeard. Because, as any hipster will tell you, there’s more to having a beard… Continue reading

To mark the end of a month long ‘festival of facial hair’ we give you Margaret Pelling’s salute to the barber. And thanks and farewell to Alun Withey – our wonderful guest editor for ‘Movember’. (For men only – as… Continue reading

Bearded ladies have long been one of the most familiar of performers in travelling shows and circuses. Often it was the contrast between their femininity and their wild, masculine appearance – bearded face and hairy body – that attracted an audience.… Continue reading

Writer Lucinda Hawksley provides the seventh in our series of posts for Movember.  The series is commissioned by guest editor and “pogonographer-in-chief” for the month, Dr Alun Withey. My book, Moustaches, Whiskers & Beards, a history of facial hair in portraiture,… Continue reading

Christopher Oldstone-Moore provides the sixth in our series of posts for Movember.  The series was commissioned by guest editor and “pogonographer-in-chief”  Dr Alun Withey. In 1913, the British Army faced a minor revolt within its ranks. Some officers were petitioning… Continue reading

There have always been attempts to curb the hair loss and greyness long associated with ageing. A beard that grew a different colour to the head hair, for example, could be – and still can be – an irritating inconsistency.… Continue reading

To mark Movember, we invited “pogonographer-in-chief” Alun Withey, to commission a month of posts celebrating the history and culture of facial hair. Here’s the fifth in the series, by Clodagh Tait. Hair was a political issue in early modern Ireland.… Continue reading

To mark Movember, we invited “pogonographer-in-chief” Alun Withey, to commission a month of posts celebrating the history and culture of facial hair. Here’s the fourth in the series, by Justin Bengry. Having slept little, enjoying only a fitful and restless… Continue reading

To mark Movember, we invited “pogonographer-in-chief” Alun Withey, to commission a month of posts celebrating the history and culture of facial hair. Here’s the third in the series, by Jessica P Clark. In July 1870, a sensational trial unfolded at… Continue reading

In the Library collections is this print intriguingly captioned “The false bearded sapeurs-pompiers at Fourneaux”. The caption tells us that the figures are firefighters in a small town on the French-Italian border, but what’s the story behind the false beards?… Continue reading