Section
Customs and Rites
Mourning, marriage, wartime, hair and the rituals that shaped appearance
Adornment has almost always been about belonging, grief, rank and occasion before it was about attraction.
- 01
Mourning, and what grief did to appearance
For much of the nineteenth century, bereavement came with a written dress code, a shopping list and a timetable. It supported an entire industry.
- 02
Marriage rites and the made up face
The white wedding is younger than most people think, and the assumptions attached to it are younger still. Other traditions made entirely different choices.
- 03
Beauty under rationing, and the duty to look well
Cosmetics were never rationed in Britain, but they became scarce and expensive. What happened next says a great deal about what appearance is for.
- 04
The politics of hair across several centuries
Hair has been taxed, legislated, forcibly cut and required to be covered. It is the part of the body most consistently subject to rules.
- 05
Men and grooming across history
The idea that men have only recently started grooming is wrong in every period you care to check. What changes is what counts as grooming.
- 06
Ageing as a cultural construct
Old age has a history. When it starts, what it looks like and what it entitles you to have all been decided repeatedly, and differently.
- 07
Bathing cultures and the civic body
The Roman thermae, the hammam, the sento and the Victorian public baths were all answers to the same question, and they answered it very differently.
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