Fashion's most iconic hairstyles

Anna Piaggi had them cut only by Vidal Sassoon, Yves Saint Laurent lived in fear of losing them, and Rick Owens wears them smooth and long down to his shoulders: hair, like everything that inhabits our body, becomes a vehicle of communication in every respect. On the runway, on the street, in city and provincial salons or in the styling offices of brands and magazines, discussions about hair styling can go on for hours. Despite being destined for a physiological fall dictated by their life cycle, hair is continuously manipulated by our cuts and hairstyles. In 2018, even the MoMA wondered about the political and identity implications that could affect this piliferous mass composed mostly of keratin and sulfur bridges. The answers, as with any soft power vehicle, did not arrive in absolute form. That's why we questioned the minds of some of the creative directors who have written the history of fashion, trying to interpret the different lines of thought regarding fashion and its creative processes by taking their hair as an indisputable parameter of judgment.

So, here's everything you should know about fashion's creative directors and their hair.

 At the top of Condé Nast

If you've seen the documentary The September Issue, you might have realised how the pairing of Anna Wintour - Grace Coddington relies on intentionally functional contrasts: the geometric rigor of Vogue's entire ecosystem head's jaw-defined bob contrasts with the fulvous and undisciplined volume of Vogue US's creative director. The first relies exclusively on the scissors of Andreas Anastasis, the second dyed her hair red for the first time in the '90s on the advice of Steven Meisel. It was Meisel's then-boyfriend who took care of her first coloring, although later Coddington, on the advice of fashion editor Phyllis Posnick, entrusted her hair to Louis Licari. What is certain is that she would never give up her red hair, "because it lifts your spirits. I mean, every time I redo mine, it's like taking a big, deep breath in some way."

Karl Lagerfeld's Ponytail

The creation of a myth often involves the construction of an immediately recognizable character. Karl Lagerfeld had already understood this in the 1970s when he tied his curls in a soft low ponytail - little did he know that, on the advice of the Elizabeth Arden communication team, the ponytail would become his unmistakable trademark. To preserve the success of his campaigns and income, the fashion Kaiser signed his hairstyle with white powder, following a practice popular among 18th-century men. "After his hair turned completely white, he loved to spray his ponytail with white dry shampoo à la Marie Antoinette, and I always had to dust off the excess powder from his jacket when he was photographed," recounts hairstylist and collaborator Sam McKnight. Lagerfeld, after all, knew that to think in pink, one needed black and white armor.

Miuccia Prada's '60s Waves

She recently brought hangover hair to the runway with hairstylist Guido Palau with the FW23 collection of Miu Miu: the disheveled tufts of the models, as if they had just gotten out of bed, allude to a pre-eminently instinctive way of thinking and dressing. Observing the hairstyle of the creative director of Prada and Miu Miu, it is easily understandable how two opposite archetypes coexist in the designer: Miuccia Prada flaunts a shoulder-length cut that takes up the iconography of the '60s lob but framed in a wave starting from the hairline. The reference could be that of a Monica Vitti in Deserto Rosso, but reinterpreted in a Miu Miu key with a wet effect enriched with clips, accessories, or a re-nylon headband.

Rei Kawakubo's Bob

When Yohji Yamamoto first presented himself to hairstylist Julien d'Ys in Paris in the '80s, it was almost identical to how he appears now: black oversized clothes, a punk aura, a bob just above the shoulders, and a fringe perfectly aligned with the eyebrows. Despite succumbing to an asymmetric cut in 1983 and a more wavy styling in the '90s, Rei Kawakubo's bob remains her unmistakable stylistic signature. Hers has always been a poetic manifesto dedicated to the exaltation of the purity of volumes and geometries, so much so that her hairstylist d'Ys was allowed to distort the hair texture: for the FW12 collection, he proposed neon wigs, while for SS16, he surprised insiders with models' heads wrapped in clouds of fiery faux curls.

Rick Owens' Long Hair

"Breaking: Rick Owens' hair is curly and white," proclaimed an article on The Cut in 2017. In the same year, T-Mag released a documentary video on the goth American designer's routine filmed at his home in Paris: in addition to applying dark dye to his eyebrows with a toothbrush, Rick Owens drinks espresso and checks emails while letting the black dye set on his regrowth. Moreover, Owens, naturally curly, undergoes sessions of chemical straightening treatments at a London salon. Longtime hairstylist and collaborator Duffy recounts that in the designer's collections, there is no trace of what is commonly considered "cute, beautiful, or perfect. There is the deconstructed, the destroyed, the homemade and improvised effect." Trends matter little to Owens.

Demna's Extreme Buzzcut

In 2018, Demna declared to The Guardian that elegance is not relevant in his creative vision. His extreme buzzcut could only testify to the urgency of someone who takes fashion seriously and turns it into a theatrical spectacle balancing between the cathartic power of tragedy and the irreverent verve of comedy. The silhouette of the creative director of Balenciaga, just like his haircut, is a kind of ground zero of fashion: no frills, little time, maximum impact.