1480s Florentine Hair - A Tutorial

One of my personal soapboxes about SCA garb is that people should pay more attention to the details - you put all that work into making a dress/doublet/tunic. So why stop just short of your goal? Make and wear some accessories! And ladies, if you're not covering your head with a hat or hood or veil, then do your hair!

And so, to further this goal, here is my tutorial for one Renaissance hair style, popular in 1480s Florence. In addition to the inspiration portrait from the previous post, here are some additional examples of the style in portraits.

And lastly, this lady is wearing almost the exact same hair style, but without the white snood/cap thing. Instead, her hair is elegantly twisted in a coil and taped down with ribbons.

All of these ladies have their hair parted down the middle. The top and back sections of the hair are pulled back, pinned in a bun, and covered with a cap, while a section of curly or wavy hair hangs down near the temple. My hair is very fine and straight - the only way I can get it to hold a curl is to curl it wet with sponge rollers or rag curls, and let them dry that way. I have no luck with curling irons or hot rollers. So, for this tutorial, I chose to curl my hair using the rag curl method. I haven't researched whether this method was used in period, but it is certainly technology that would have been available to them at the time. And it works well for my hair type. Please feel free to curl your hair using whatever method works for you. Also, please excuse the self-portraits, as I had no one to help me with the picture-taking side of things.

So, to begin. Wash your hair, towel dry the excess water from it, and comb it out.

Pull back the hair from your temples to just below the crown of your head and secure this hair out of the way in a bun or ponytail. Section off two pieces near your temples by making a part from just behind your ear straight up to meet the top section. Secure the remaining hair at the back of your head out of the way.

Now you are left with two sections of hair between each temple and ear. Curl these sections however you like. I'm doing rag curls. With the hair still damp, place a strip of fabric over a finger or two and wind the hair around your finger(s). Then you can roll the curl up the last couple of inches and secure it it place by tying the fabric strip in a single square knot.

...and proceed with the rest of the hair.

I braided the uncurled sections of hair, mostly to keep them from getting tangled with the curling rags while I slept.

And then I went to bed. The hair dries overnight, giving me beautiful curls that actually stay in my hair for at least most of a day. Woot! And here we are the next morning:

I went ahead and removed the braids from the uncurled hair sections, and pulled this hair back into as smooth a bun as I could manage. I kept the center part in place. I tried to arrange the top section so that the sides kind of swooshed over the top of the curled sections.

Then, start taking down those rag curls!

If you hair is shorter than mine, you can probably stop here and just leave the curls hanging loose. I'm convinced that the ladies in the period portraits had the temple sections of their hair cut shorter. My hair is about waist length, and I am not willing to cut it. So I decided to swoosh these sections back and pin them to the back bun. They look a bit short here, but it worked out well, because my hair fell a bit throughout the day, and the curled sections looked longer.

I ran my fingers through the curls a bit to break up the ringlets, then wrapped the very ends of these sections around the back bun and pinned it in place. Then, I pinned my cap/snood/caul over the back bun, and was ready to go!

It held up relatively well throughout the day. As I mentioned, the curls fell a bit and the side sections looked longer. I got several compliments on it. It's amazing how much of a different in your overall look it makes to put a little effort into your hair. I encourage all SCAdian ladies to try their own period hair styles, then show them off and spread the word!