The Goth Guide 14: Hair Style

Goth Slang Word of the Day

• Doom Cookie: A goth, usually female, that has no fashion sense.  She also tends to never really smile or break the "gothiness" of her attitude.

Goth Band of the Day

• Cocteau Twins [formed in 1979, Scottish]

The hair of the populous has always been an important part of the fashions throughout the world. However, the goth hairstyles seem almost crutial to pull off the look at times. The outfits themselves consist of not only the traditional red corset, fish net shirt and black PVC pants, but victorian dresses, black skirt tutus, neon striped tights, etc. With such variety in clothing fashion, there are also going to be a few hair styles to match them.

The hair that can often be seen on the traditional goths are a backcombed, or the american term, teased, hair style. This style was a bit common in the 80's, but what made the hair of the average teen and a goth was the way the hair looked. Your average person's hair looked a bit more kempt, organized and curled even a bit.

Though they had a similar look, goth hair was traditionally dyed black, and gave off a more eery cobweb look compared to just the fluff and poof that the current style had.

How to get this style

In order to get this look, you must first have a straightening iron, large bristle brush, a few combs, and [a lot of] hairspray. A few pony tails or clips to hold back part of the hair while you work is also useful.

• The first thing you will want to do is make sure that your hair is clean and straight enough. Teasing will cause more damage to the hair when done without these conditions. Also, it will be harder to work with. If your hair is not straight, flatten and straighten it with your straightening iron. Brush it out and make sure there are no tangles in it with the bristle brush.
• Once your hair is straight and cooled down if you used a straight iron, [cooled down hair is crutial. Warm hair can break easier.] then it is time to start with the backcombing process.
• Take a wide yet thin lock of the hair, preferably on the top front of your head, and lift it up straight into the air by brushing up straight with your comb. Take your comb and, after placing it into your hair a few inches or so away from your root, drag it back and forth gently along your hairstrands to the root of your hair. This is why it is called backcombing. You are combing opposite of usual brushing your hair in small pieces.
• As you backcomb from those few inches to the root a few times, your hair should be getting this "base of the feather" look to it. that is when you move up the hair and backcomb to the root from a few inches farther.Once you finish with the first strand, hair spray it, and let it go. See what it does.

[[The above pictures are not of me, but of a woman off of YouTube, named DeathlyNighShade. Her channel can be found here. Please give her props for making the vid that I found these pictures of. Thanks!]]

**EDIT**  Her username is actually Deathly Nightshade, not Deadly.  Sorry for the mix up.

This can also be done with the J-goth hair for men, called Visual Kei. Bands like Dir En Grey has such a hair style. The only difference that normally they have very vibrant bright colors, such as cherry red, silver, and white.

Another traditional hair style for the traditional look is crimped hair. They actually have cosmetic tools called crimpers that can give your hair that curvy crimpy look. However, you can also put your hair in two very tight braids after taking a shower or bath and getting it wet, and dry it a bit and sleep on it. In the morning, once you undo the hair, it should be a series of tiny curls and crimps.

A third popular look is the Mohawk. Now, not just any mohawk will do. A gothic mohawk tends to be down and hanging to one side of the head of a person which can also be known as a downhawk. Another way that it can be worn is up and backcombed. It can be called the deathhawk, and is worn by Razorcandi.

Now, I wasn't really aware of this hairstyle until about a year ago when a friend decided to wear it in homage to Rogue of Cruxshadows. He called it the "shadowhawk." I called it the "Sokka from The Last Airbender." The way his hair was different from this singer's hair was that he had simply teased it a bit and put it in a pony tail and allowed his bangs to hand down his face on either side of his cheek. it was very short on the bottom half of his head, however.

As you can see, there are many different styles to choose from with just traditional looks alone.

Cyber hair, in my opinion, is the most complex looking out of the hair styles.  The reason I think this is because of the fact that most cyber goths tend to wear items called hair falls.  They can also be known as hair extensions.  They are long locks of fake hair that is attached to ponytails on a cyber's head.  This can be for regular pony tails, pigtails, or even five different tails atop your head if you feel like it!

The hair of a cyber can be any color to multiple colors such as just black, just blue, just green, etc. and can be streaked with every color of the rainbow.

Now, the hair falls or extensions can be a number of different things.  Not only do cyber goths use fake hair extensions that can be found in salons, but they have been known to make hair falls made out of yawn, ribbons, strings, bendable plastic tubes, etc.  The items listed can be in a dread pattern, in small braids, crimped, small ringlets, etc.  There is nothing that gets you more creative than cyber goth hair.

Though you can both make and buy these different hair falls, not everyone does.  Some get an entire wig instead to wear the hair instead of going through the trouble of creating hair falls.  This is perfectly fine as well.

If you would like to know how to make cyber hair falls, please click here for the info and basic tips.

This category can also hold hairstyles for the Vampire goth, Steampunk goth, Lolita goth, and Ethereal goth.

Hairstyles that you see on the romantic goths are generally long and flowing, straight or curled, but these styles also carry a lot of variety as well. Colors are traditionally solids and are usually either black and dark colors like blue, purle, and crimson. One to two streaks upon the front of the bangs of a white, silver, or another pastel color to offset and match with the darker hair.

If you do not wish to have these streaks, and instead have bangs, then that is also a very fashionable romantic goth look. Now, I have seen both the regular straight cut bangs, and also the pointed triangle bangs, also known to be vangs. However, vangs seem to be more of a vampire's look. if you really wish to pull off an alternative romantic look, then have the long straight hair, bangs or vangs, and have the offset secondary color streaking the bangs. It is not commonly done and it is gorgeous.

Sometimes, the streaks can go as far as the entire half of your hair, while the other half is black or another dark color.  I tend to call it the "Half n Half."

In the past, such as the Victorian era, Elizabethian era, and so on, there have been a wide selection of hairstyles for both men and women that looked elegant and beautiful. These hairstyles, when done in a proper manner, can be a lovely accent to your romantic garb. I myself have been known to tease my hair completely aside from my bangs, prop it up into a crazy teased out victorian bob bun on my head. It works for my outfits.

Bear in mind that they also make wigs of such hairstyles as well, so do not fret if you do not wish to go to such color differences and hair cuts.

 As you can see, I have listed some of the types of goths above, but which ones did I not list and why?

Well, the ones that were omitted were the Mopey goth, the Perky goth, the Corp goth, the Baby Bat, and the Bondage goth and Goth-a-billy.  These goths tend to not really have a hairstyle theme of their own as prominently as the others do.  Perky goth tends to wear bright colors.  Mopey goths have nothing but black with hair that probably usually hands loosely along their face.  Baby bats can range from anything depending on what brand of goth their are evolving into.  Bondage goths can range from anything as well.  Goth-a-billys seem to wear 80's and even 50's regular hairstyles.

There were also a few hairstyles that I omitted that did not fall into a category specifically.  there is the bald look.  Some goths decide to simply shave off all the hair.  Yes, both men and women do this.

Hair styles can also range from any length, from short to long, curly to straight.  It's just all about coordinating it with what you are wearing over all.

Below, I have a few more pictures of hairstyles that is worth looking at.  Enjoy!

<Previous].........~@~.........[Next>