| Dressy Hair Styles - Part #1 The Classic Updo - French Twist |
| Karen Marie Shelton - Copyright - All
Rights Reserved |
| Revised:
03-19-09 - Original Publication Date: 10/12/2000 |
Introduction
Every year during
the major dress-up seasons (Prom, Homecoming, Christmas) I receive lots of email
from females of all ages who want to "do something different" with their hair.
(Photo of Karen Marie Shelton to the side from the HairBoutique.com
library - all rights strictly reserved).
They want to wear their hair up, they want to add special touches (like flowers or
jewelry) or they want to try something completely new.
I can relate. I usually wear my
"below the waist" naturally thick, wavy hair down in a "nothing
special" loose look.
However, I do get moments where I yearn for a cool "updo" or something new.
Especially for a formal party, wedding or other dressy hair event.
Recently I spent a couple of hours with my hairstylist, Shelley Pryor
(formerly of a salon in Plano, Texas, but now out of the hair business) experimenting with some updos, braids and new
looks.
Part of my motivation was to play with some
hair
accessories from
The Hair Boutique
and get some great photos. Another part of my motivation was to check out some new styles.
The Classic Formal Do - The French Twist
One of the very first hairstyles that Shelley tried on my hair was the classic French
Twist. Shelley pointed out that the French Twist style can be worn by just about anyone
with medium to super long hair.
(Photo of to the side from the HairBoutique.com library - all rights
strictly reserved).
If you have your heart set on wearing a Twist and have short hair, you can always
"cheat" a little and pin on home hair and use your own hair to cover the
"add-on" twist.
The Twist can be dressed up or down, worn high or flat, adorned with flowers,
hair jewelry,
pearls or curls and can be modified to look good with just about any face shape.
It's a
wonderful style for instantly dressing up a wedding or a formal event.
I had not really thought about the modification part, but Shelley pointed out
that you can add or subtract a wide assortment of bangs, side curls, tendrils, parts,
coils or twists to slim a round face, give height to a long face, show off a slender face
or camouflage any other shape.
Shelley is right. The French Twist is a classic style.
I will be including photos of several versions of the French Twist. I have selected a
wide range of "modifications" that can be used to create different looks. Where
possible I am giving complete credit to the photos that I have selected.
Basic French Twist Versus Complicated Twists
I have always found it difficult to explain to anyone how to do a French Twist.
If you have never down a French Twist on yourself, I strongly recommend that you have a
friend or stylist do the first couple of Twists for you.
Watch closely and then when you feel comfortable, you can practice doing the Twist on
your own hair.
There is the basic French Twist which is a simple hair updo twist. With some practice
and visualization and a good mirror, anyone with medium to long hair can do a Twist to
their own hair.
There is also the very complicated types of French Twists where the hair is divided
into multiple sections and many different types of pins and swirls and curls are added.
I have never been able to pull one of these off by myself. Maybe you will be able to,
but generally it is best to have a friend or hairstylist help you with the more
complicated updos. At least until you get the hang of it.
Instructions For Do-It-Yourself French Twist
The following instructions are inspired by
"Beautiful
Braids: The Step-by-Step Guide to Braiding Styles for Every Occasion and All Ages by
Patricia Coen and Joe Maxwell." This book was originally published in 1984 and is
the book that I used to learn how to do my own French twist. It was recently
re-released.
The following instructions are the easiest instructions I have ever found in any book
that describes how to do a French Twist.
Beautiful Braids includes a step-by-step of line drawings that demonstrate each step. I
think Patrician Coen and Joe Maxwell would not appreciate me giving any more information
than I already have.
I can not recommend their book highly enough if you want to teach yourself to do a
French Twist.
- Comb or brush your hair smoothly back from your forehead.
- Gather your hair into a ponytail with a base halfway between your crown and nape and
slightly to the left of center. Don’t anchor it.
- Twist the ponytail all the way around twice, in a clockwise direction. This holds the
base of the hair closer to your head and gives you a firm anchor to work against.
- Hold the base of the ponytail in your left hand. With your right, hold its end up,
pointing toward the ceiling.
- With your right hand, fold the end of the ponytail, about the top third, down towards
the nape of your neck.
- Fold the entire ponytail down under itself, towards your nape so that is it less than
half as long as it was.
- Curl the folded ponytail in your left hand. There should be a slight hollow between the
ponytail and your scalp.
- With your right hand, begin to gently push the upper right hand portion of the folded
ponytail down into the hollow.
- Continue pushing the hair underneath your left hand into the hollow so that the folded
ponytail is slowly rolling inside the hollow.
- The twist is complete when you can’t push any additional hair into the hollow and
the folded ponytail has become a tight roll.
- Create a seam by tucking in bobby pins along the line formed where the right hand edge
of the roll meets your scalp starting at the bottom.
- Place bobby pins all along the seam up to the top of the roll, concealing them just
under the roll.
- Begin to push the upper portion of the ponytail over into the space with the other hand,
so that the folded part is slowly rolling over into it.
- When you have pushed all the hair in, secure with hairgrips along the seam formed by the
join, starting at the bottom. Conceal the grips by pushing them right underneath the roll.
Basic Twist Instructions From 388 Great Hairstyles
Margit Rudiger & Renate von Sampson provide some wonderful examples of French
Twists on page 78-79 of their
stunning book of 388 Great
Hairstyles.
They also provide some instructions that are short and sweet and to the point. I have
included their instructions for people who like to cut to the chase.
Note: The sample below is directly from the book and is
designed to be a casual French Twist for thick or naturally wavy hair.
- Brush hair up to the crown.
With your left hand, hold hair together one-third up the length.
- Turn all hair under near the scalp around the middle finger of the right hand.
- Turn the ends underneath on themselves into a roll and pin.
Pin the roll through the center to your head with a long clip, from top down. Hold with
hairpins.
How To Tease Your Hair For Fullness
The bigger you want your French Twist to be, the more volume you need to build into the
look. There are several ways to get the height.
If you don't have colored or bleached hair you can use a volume
building shampoo and volume building conditioner like the
Phyto
Volume Building System.
A
volume building setting gel would help as well. Once you have towel dried your
hair to remove most of the moisture use a
blow dryer with a round brush to dry your hair with as much fullness as possible.
Try
Phytodefrisant
or
KMS
Flat Out if your hair is wavy or curly to remove any
kinks and get a smooth straight look.
You can even throw in a few very large hot rollers and build in even more fullness.
If this seems like too much trouble, you can carefully tease or
backcomb your hair to
the fullness that you want.
Tease your hair only on special occasions or else you may damage your hair. Teasing or
"backcombing" will create lots of volume.
Remember to be gentle as possible to avoid damaging the hair.
- Separate hair into approximately 1 inch sections.
- Spritz each section lightly with a good setting gel
- Starting from the middle of each section, gently back-comb the hair towards the roots.
- With wide tooth comb, smooth hair into place.
- Spritz with hairspray to hold firmly in place.
French Twist With Draped Bangs
This look is designed to be a large, full on top, vertical French Twist created to
achieve a very classic up look.
Wide draped bangs and a single tendril on each cheek makes this a beautiful sexy look
that can slenderize a round face, show off an oval face, add height and balance to a long
face and soften a square face.
This look would work with
just about any face shape.
The hair shown in Figures 1 & 2 was specifically created by Mariano Roche. These
styles are shown on pages 48 - 49 of the book, "A Long Hair Collection"
from the Pivot Point Design Forum collection .
The beautiful model has medium thick, shoulder length hair all in one length. The hair
was first washed and air dried using a round brush to give as much volume as possible.
The front of the hair was sectioned from the back, ear to ear. A key point to note is
that the hair was fixed in 4 major sections.
The back of the hair that forms the twist consisted of the right and left sides. The
front of the hair was also divided and fixed in two separate sections: the right side and
the left side.
A diagonal side
part is sub sectioned from the front of the hair to the back of the hair.
The hair was backcombed or teased all over. To get the height in the front, all of the
hair in the crown area was heavily teased.
The right side of the hair was smoothed over the left and secured with bobby pins along
a slight diagonal. A good holding spray was used to hold the hair in place.
The left side was smoothed over to the right. The ends were turned to form a vertical
roll. The roll was secured tightly with bobby pins and hairpins. The hair was twisted to
give an upward movement at the nape of the neck which helped to keep the nape closer to
the head and the crown a lot fuller.
Styling Notes
This is not a French Twist style that I could ever easily do by myself. I had to have
my stylist to it for me. If you decide that you want to try your hand at this style here
are some helpful hints:
- The key to the height of this style was the fact that the hair is first divided into
front and back sections and then divided again into left and right parts.
- Use large pins or clips to section off the parts of the hair that you are not currently
working with to keep everything clean and neat.
- A lot of heavy teasing is required to give the height. The more volume you can get in
your hair from shampoo, setting gel and a round brush, the better the height.
- Some people like Ivana Trump "cheat" and get instant fullness with a hair
rat. These can be purchased at most beauty supply stores. I have even heard that some
people use clean balled up nylons for the same effect. This eliminates the need for a lot
of teasing.
- A good hair spray is essential. (Sebastian
Shaper Plus Hair Spray or similar firm hairspray).
- When you use hair spray, make sure to aim the spray directly at the parts of the hair
that need the most hold.
- Good bobby pins and hair pins the same color as your hair is required. Have plenty on
hand.
- Use a control product like a wax, gel or stick (like
Phytolisse
Shine or similar) to smooth down any loose hairs and add shine.
- Have a stylist do this for you first and then try it at home.
- Practice, practice, practice.
Sexy, Playful French Twist With Sweeping Side
This twist is a very sexy and playful version of the traditional look. It is shown on
page 79 of the
388 Great
Hairstyles book.
While the Twist
is high and very smooth, a very large piece of hair has been playfully pulled free from
the updo and lightly curls down around the front of the face.
This beautiful updo would look smashing in a short glittery party dress. For Christmas
it would look beautiful adorned with tiny sprigs of holly or a glittery red ruby pin.
To create this look make sure to tease the hair at the crown very well. Before twisting
the hair into the updo, let one thick lock of hair fall loosely across the side of the
face.
Use a curling iron to add a very soft curl at the bottom of the lock of hair.
This look works especially well with bangs that are worn soft and texturized or
straight and shiny.
Casual, Messy Twists
A French Twist can be softened to work beautifully in a casual setting. The French
Twist shown here was taken from the book
388 Great
Hairstyles.
This more casual version of
the Roll simply has the ends protrude at the top of the crown after the hair is turned
under.
The lower part of the French Roll needs to be pinned tightly to support the hair that
is pulled out at the top to form the extra loop or protrusion.
Be sure to have plenty of pins to form a solid foundation. To hold the base, be sure to
use a good hairspray.
New Woman magazine for
December 1998 displayed this wonderful "French Twist For The 90s" in the
Beauty/Hair column by Albertina Rizzo. The Twist was actually done by Rosario
Acquita,
Artistic Director of the Kim Lepine Salon in New York City.
The French Twist is created with the idea that several strands will be twisted out and
away from the main French Roll. The loose strands are pinned around the Twist to give it a
messy, freeform look.
This messy French Twist is a version of the popular messy and undone buns that are
still hot in many hair circles. This Twist works great in a casual setting.
It is recommend that this Twist be done on thick and wavy hair. Highlights look
smashing with the twisted messy loose strands.
Dressed Up Twists
I could probably write an entire article on how to dress up the French Twist.
Depending on the time of the year just let your imagination run wild. You can add
Evergreen, tiny Christmas ornaments, glittery clips or anything else that you desire to a
beautiful Twist.
The following
photo is taken from
Patrick
Cameron's Book - Dressing Long Hair Patrick adorned a beautiful full French
Twist with some greenery that celebrates Fall or nature.
I personally love to add different types, colors and styles of
hairsticks
depending on the event and my mood.
The first photo shows me with
a classic smooth French Twist that has been adorned with the
Hair Sticks.
The sticks looked stunning with a beautiful blue jacket and dress that I wore.
Hair sticks never go out of style and can be used in so many
different ways.
This photo gives you a
better view of the French Twist with the sticks.
Many people ask me how I use the stick to
hold up my hair. I don’t. I always use a lot of bobby pins to tighten down the updo
and then after I have used the appropriate amount of hairspray I carefully arrange the
sticks or jewelry in my hair.
I usually don’t get the sticks in the way I want them the first time and often
will play with them until I achieve just the right look.
Special Hair Sticks & Barrettes
The following two Twists were taken from page 17 of The American Woman Special Complete
Hair & Beauty Guide for 1997.
Unfortunately the photos were only available in black and white, I liked the look of
the hair sticks and the long French Twist hair barrette so much that I decided to go ahead
and include these photos in this article.
The French
Twist to the right actually uses three different hair sticks and some special ribbon to
adorn the back of the updo.
This beautiful French Twist
(left) is adorned with one long barrette or French twist clip. You will often find the
long clips at places like
HairBoutique.com's
Marketplace.
Every once in awhile I will find a beautiful long clip that I can use in a similar way
in the fashion accessory area of the local clothing store.
Business French Twist
The French Twist can
instantly transform hair into classy "business" looks. Many executive women will
put their hair into a smooth French Twist.
Women with hair that’s shoulder-length or longer can get it out of the way at the
office and retain a very polished, professional image by wearing it up.
This French Twist from the Hair Boutique Gallery shows a precise French twist that can
make the transition easily from day to evening in a snap.
The look can instantly be softened up by pulling out some additional tendrils on the
sides, and at the Nape of the neck and using a portable curling iron to add a romantic
look.
Another option is to take part of the French Twist down and go with the Half Up/Half
Down French Twist that is displayed in Hair Boutique Gallery photo 263T.
Half Up/Half Down French Twist
This style is the
ultimate romantic look that combines the elegance of the French Twist "updo"
with the soft romantic looks of flowing hair. The one curled tendril from the top of the
crown adds a sexy touch.
While hair that is medium length to longer looks best in this style, you can
"cheat" with some large electric curlers that can give you instant volume, lift
and curl.
Classic Bridal French Twist
Every time I open a Bride’s magazine I see multiple variations of the French
Twist. This is because the hairstyle is so versatile it can work with just about any type
of wedding gown, headpiece or style.
The French Twist can be modified to look great on the Bride, the attendants or the
mothers of the wedding couple.
I recently attended a
wedding where the Bride and all her attendants and her mother all had variations of the
same French Twist. The result was stunning.
The photo shown here is an example of a classic Bridal French Twist. This example of a
perfect Bridal Twist was taken from the July/August 1994 Bridal Guide.
Hair was done by Angel Torres. Hair color was done by Michelle Becking.
Classic Bridesmaid Twist With Flowers
This photo of
the bridesmaid with a soft round French Twist was taken from the December 1998/January
1999 Bride’s magazine. The bridesmaid was part of a WTOO advertisement.
What struck me the most about this photo was the way that delicate sprigs of flowers
were pinned strategically around the French Twist. The flowers give the dress the
appropriate wedding feel.
Celebrity French Twists
Kirstie Alley
wore a classic "big" French Twist her first season on television in
Veronica’s Closet.
The red highlights in the bangs and at the crown turn Kirstie’s classic twist into
a glamorous updo.
The highlights also have the advantage of adding a slimming quality to the face and
attracts attention to Kirstie’s beautiful eyes.
The new temporary mascaras would be an excellent tool to try on a twist. Try painting
some highlights around the bangs, temples and crown of your hair to jazz up your
updo.
Jerry Hall (Mrs. Mick Jagger) often appears with her long locks rolled up into a
classic Twist.
Jerry (shown here in the August 11, 1998 issue of the National Examiner) usually appears with
sweeping bangs to soften the updo. Sometimes she will have a few strands pulled from the
top of the twist and looped around the top of her crown to hide the opening of the twist.
The added loop of hair at the top of the French Twist gives the hairstyle an added
touch of elegance. Jerry doesn’t need to worry about having enough volume for her
hair. Her normal hair is long and full and works nicely in the Twist updo.
As the photos demonstrates, Jerry’s twist looks fabulous with a gorgeous evening
gown, beautiful jewelry and shiny blonde hair.
Conclusion
If you only master one updo in your entire life and it is the French Twist, you are
basically set forever.
The French Twist is one of the most basic updos. A good basic Twist can be the
foundation for a dressy updo adorned with flowers,
jeweled hair sticks, or
seasonal trinkets. The Twist can also be worn sleek and clean for a business
look or messy and bold for more casual encounters.
I am sure that I did not find all the examples of French Twist versions that are out
there. The way things go, I will definitely find another 10-15 the minutes this article is
published.
This article on the French Twists is just the first in a long series of articles on
Dressy Hairstyles. I can console myself with the idea that I can play catch up at the end
of this series of articles.
If you happen to find any great French Twists that I forgot this time around, let me
know and we can revisit this classic again down the road. |