Little Lord Fauntleroy Suits: Hair Styles


Figure 1.--This American boy were photographed about 1905. He wears a relatively short hair style. This boy looks like his hair has been curled, but it is not long enough to form ringlets. Click on the image to see the suit he and his older brother were wearing. Image courtesy of Anna O'Bryant

American boys wore Little Lord Fauntleroy suits with a large variety of hair styles. Certainly the most recognizable style associate with Little Lord Fauntleroy velvet suits are ringlet curls. Ringlets were not the most common style, but have become associated with Fauntleroy suits in the popular mind--at least in America. It was more common to wear a variety of short hair cuts with Fauntleroy suits. Some were shirt hair cuts rather like those worn by older boys. Othrs were relatively short cuts, but done in a variety of fancy styles. We have also notice hair longer hair styles both covering and not covering the ears, but not shoulder lengh. The ringlets curls were styled in a variety of different ways. There were a variety of thicknessses and number. Oten ringlets were done in shoulder length styles, but not always.

Ringlets

Perhaps the style most associated with ringlet cirls is the Fauntleroy suit. Large numbers of American boys wore their fancy Fauntleroy suits with ringlet curls. This included both actual formal Little Lord Fauntleroy suits and a variery of other suits with Fauntleroy styling. Despite the association, however, most boys who wore Fauntleoy suits did not have the added indiginy to bear of also wearng ringlets. Based on the available photographic record, HBC estimates thar the number of boys wearing ringlets with Fauntleroy suits was 10-20 percent with the percentage falling for the older boys.

Regular Short Hair

It was more common to wear a variety of short hair cuts with Fauntleroy suits. Some were short hair cuts rather like those worn by older boys. Many boys as soon as their curls were cut, wore short hair styles like their older brothers. Thus we see many quite young boys wearing hair styles like ctheir older brothers. This included many boys wearing clothes thst were still very dufferent thsntherir older brothers, including Fauntleroy suits.

Fancy Short Hair

Othrs were relatively short cuts, but done in a variety of fancy styles.

Medium Length

We have also notice hair longer hair styles both covering and not covering the ears, but not shoulder lengh. The ringlets curls were styled in a variety of different ways. There were a variety of thicknessses and number. Often ringlets were done in shoulder length styles, but not always. We have also noted ringlets in medium-lengh hair as well.

Uncurled Long Hair

The 19th photographic record is dominated by the United States because photography was so popular in the United States. We are not entirely sure why this was, but we believe in part reflects the growing prosperity in America. This is no where more true than with the Fauntleroy style. It was more popular in America than Europe and this difference is magnified by the greater prevalence of ohotography in America. As a result, there is a trong association of finglet curls with the Fauntleroy suit. Most boys did not wear the Guntleoy suit sith long hsir, but in America most of the boys with long hair did wear ringlets. This was less true in Europe. Some English boys did wear ringlets, to the extent that the French called ringlets, English curls. American curls woulkd have been a more accurate term. We believe this was because the French had more contact with the neaeby English. Actually the English pattern was varied, we see both curled and uncurled hair with Fauntleroy suits. The French pattern was less varied. We see quite a few boys with long, uncurled hair. We are less sure about other countries, but the Fauntleroy sytle was less popular in many other European countries, especially Germany. The uncurled long hair could be one at different lengths and we see the front done diffeently, usually with bangs but not always. And the front bangs were done in a varuety of ways.






HBC








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Created: February 19, 2002
Last updated: 6:02 PM 10/5/2011