Hair Affairs

By Norah Blucher

For so many it is all about the clothes and while I positively obsess over clothes as much as anyone, hair is on an equally high pedestal for me. Perhaps, coming from a family of hair stylists, it’s genetic, but tailors and seamstresses are also in the tree, so perhaps I’m just blessed... or cursed. My accountant and the local outlet mall would likely give you differing opinions. 

I always felt that one’s hair says so much about them. People regularly change clothes to fit their job or task du jour, but hairstyle or color are less mutable, though we often have broader liberty to pick something we like. Beyond what just may look good on a person, the pragmatic bob, sleek and professional coif, sassy perm, long elegant layers, edgy razor cut and dramatic colors speak volumes to who we are or desire to be.

Many of us here have some obstacles to the style we fancy though, be they appeasing the social norms of another life, practical reasons of work or lifestyle or our own bio hair just won’t cooperate or has even abandoned us! Whatever those reasons may be, the solution many of us turn to in order to get the look we desire is wigs. The options are endless these days and rather than view wigs as a crutch, look at them as the endless possibilities they are. I have certainly made my share of poor choices in my quest for the perfect do as well, so I hope to share with you some of the hard things I have learned along the way, as well as the fun! 

Human Hair or Synthetic?

Wigs can be procured in both human hair and synthetic versions. Human hair is obviously going to be the most lifelike; it is real hair after all, but it has some drawbacks to be aware of. It is expensive for one. A good human hair wig is going to run several times the cost of a good synthetic one with similar features. Natural hair also requires more care, so unless you like a straight style, expect to spend time styling your wig regularly, as any other girl would do with her hair. That said, it can be a lot of fun, too. 

Also note that though human hair wigs usually come in less styles and colors than synthetics, they can be cut and colored any way you like. Just for the love of god, please have a professional do this, unless you are experienced, less you drop the equivalent of a mortgage payment on something you wouldn’t wear to pull weeds from the garden.

If you are new to wigs, like to own many styles, can’t be bothered fixing your hair every day or cost is a factor, synthetic wigs are the way to go. Truth be told, I only own one human hair wig and seldom take it out and I like hair! Modern synthetic hair wigs look so lifelike, require so little fuss, are so much less expensive and come in so many styles and colors – there is something for everyone. Best of all, the style is baked into the wig and lasts, which is quite nice when your prep routine is likely too long as it is. 

Some special synthetics can also be restyled with heat tools, so you can change the look if you want and then it stays that way until you change it. Heat resistant fibers also tend to be a bit more dull and lack that tell-tale shine regular synthetics can have. Can life get any better! Just note, you need heat styling tools with a low setting and there is some skill involved. Unless you are going for an extreme restyle, a round barrel brush and a hair dryer on low is a bit more forgiving as well.

Let’s just say yours truly used a steamer once to get the frizzies out of her favorite wig (a legitimate method), got a bit over zealous and straightened the whole thing out! After shedding some tears, as though I had literally just maimed my best friend, I was fortunately able to restyle her. She never looked like she did originally, but is still rather cute and certainly as one-of-a-kind as her owner. We’ve enjoyed many more happy memories together since, so that cloud did have a silver lining!

We’re Just Getting Warmed-Up Here

I have hopefully gotten you thinking about a few things for now, so I’ll leave you to that, but I promise to be back real soon to talk more about where and how you can get the locks you desire and start your own hair affair. Until then, keep calm and wig out! Questions and comments are always welcome below or e-mail me at nblucher at-sign proton dot me.

Wearing Paula Young

Marek Kaliszuk femulating Ariana Grande on Polish television's Twoja Twarz Brzmi Znajomo.
You can view this femulation on YouTube.

Friday Femulations

I had a Zoom meeting en femme on Tuesday, so before the meeting, I had an opportunity to model the two dresses I recently Christmas-gifted myself from Venus.

The pleated turtleneck sweater dress is perfect for this time of year in frigid New England and it fits me like a glove. I like it so much that I have the same dress in black, too.

In the past, I avoided turtlenecks because it was difficult to put one on without smudging your makeup. 

One solution is to get dressed first and then do your makeup with a towel or some such over your shoulders to prevent makeup crumbs from messing up your clothing. I tried that once and it worked, but keeping the towel in place while applying makeup was a pain. 

Another solution, which I now use, is to put a plastic bag over your head after applying your makeup and slip your bagged head into the turtleneck. Works like a charm.

The animal print ruched dress is very sexy and shows off all my curves. It is also mid-thigh short, but short hemlines have never stopped me before! I will wear it to the next cocktail party I’m invited to.

And, yes, I am wearing a new hairdo: Maura from Paula Young. 

And, yes, I know it is an inexpensive wig, which runs counter to my recommendation not to go cheap when buying a wig. It was a spur-of-the-moment purchase – what can I say?

Speaking of wigs... 

I was watching Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC yesterday and fell in love with her new hairdo. And I wondered if I could find a wig like her new do. 

After a little Googling, I found a Raquel Welch wig (Upstage) that is a reasonable facsimile of Andrea’s hairdo (see below). Upstage is available in a large cap size, which makes it even more attractive, but I am a little hesitant about making the purchase because it is expensive, but that has never stopped me before! 

And so it goes.

Wearing Bebe

Helene Tagada, a Femulate reader from France

Wig Out Without

As a novice femulator, I always wore a wig cap under my wig. Not sure why. Other wig wearers wore wig caps, so I assumed they knew what they were doing and I just followed their lead. I thought that maybe it helped hide your real hair (if you had any), but I was never sure.

Large cap size head that I have, most wig caps were too tight and left red welts on my forehead. Occasionally, a tight wig cap would give me a headache, too.

Also, wig caps were hot. They essentially added an extra layer underneath the wig and caused sweating especially in the warmer weather. Sweat running down loads of makeup did not make for a pretty picture.

The last straw was when a tight wig cap worked its way off my head and ended up all balled-up under my wig!

After that, I swore off wig caps. No more wig cap welts, headaches and sweat. And my wigs did not notice the difference – they stayed in place and did not stray from my head.

There are some benefits to wearing a wig cap. You can read about them here, but they do not apply to me and I will remain wig capless ’til the day I dye.

Wearing Balmain

Phillipe Blond

Better Red?

I have a box of wigs that I have purchased over the years that I no longer wear. I had some time to kill before my Zoom presentation last week, so I decided to try on every wig in the box.

A couple looked good on me and I will wear them again. A few that I recall looking good on me in the past did nothing for me now. And the majority did not look good at all; I wondered what possessed me to buy them in the first place. Maybe they looked better on a younger and/or fatter me – go figure.

One that I don’t recall purchasing nor wearing interested me. Did I buy it and never wear it? I don’t recall, but I thought with a little cleaning and grooming, it might look nice on me. It is a Paula Young wig called Chantel in copper red, a color that I often wore until I went blond 15 years ago.

That’s me wearing Chantel in the accompanying photo. Is it a keeper or a loser?

Wearing Ollalaa

Elijah Wood, Shania Twain’s former drummer (not the film actor)

My Wig’s Not Too Small – My Head is Too Big!

In general, girls like us have bigger heads than civilian girls. So it behooves us ladies to adorn our heads with bigger wigs just like the girls above.

In my youth, I did not pay attention to wig sizes – I assumed that wigs trying to escape from my head was par for the course in WigLand. Then I bought a large-sized wig and happily discovered that it did not try to runaway from me like my average-sized wigs!

Here are some signs your wig is too small (according to wigs.com):

👧 If the wig slides back on your head and reveals your scalp or hairline, it’s too small.

👧 If the wig has a lace front, check it out. If it’s rolling under instead of lying flat, you need a bigger wig.

👧 Likewise, if your wig has a monofilament top, it should lay flat too. If the monofilament cap sticks up like a point on the top of your head, that’s a symptom of a wig that’s too small.

👧 Lastly, if it’s too tight, it’s obviously too small. If it squeezes your temples or pulls your biological hair, it’s too tight.

I learned my lesson and now I only buy large-sized wigs. They not only fit better, but they look better because they are properly proportioned for my large head.

The only problem (and it is a big problem) is that the selection of wigs in large sizes is limited. For example, I searched one online wig retailer and found 25 large-sized wigs, while that same retailer had over 650 average-sized wigs.

That is kind of discouraging, but I believe that the situation is improving. Wig manufacturers are expanding their line of large-sized wig models. For example, Gabor recently announced three new large-sized wig styles!

I don’t know if Gabor is reacting to a demand for larger wings from girls like us or not, but their new wigs are a welcome nonetheless.

Wearing Madeleine

Huntz Hall, Leo Gorcey and The Bowery Boys femulating in the 1952 film Hold That Line

Thursday Out for a New Do

I have been getting deluged with emails from wig peddlers lately, which put me in the mood to get a new do. But instead of ordering a pig in a poke online, I decided to visit my local wig merchant, Tonkin’s Wigs.

When I was a dyed-in-the-wool brunette, Kathy Tonkin plopped a blond wig on my head and it has been my go-to wig color ever since. Yeah, I know you’ve seen me in other colors for extended periods of time, but I always go back to blond (for more fun). Kathy has an excellent eye for what wigs look good on which girls, so I felt confident that she would do me good again.

Shaved, showered, made-up and dressed-up, I was out the door at 11 AM and arrived at Tonkin’s 10 minutes later. I had not been in the store in five years, but when I walked in, Kathy recognized me immediately and we caught up on old and new times.

I told Kathy to have her way with me and she said she had three wigs that she thought would look good. She was correct — all three wigs looked good and I wished I could buy them all, but we both agreed that one looked better than the others, a Noriko wig called “Sandie." 
   
I wore my new do out the door and drove to Goddess, a consignment shop for plus-size women. I am looking for a new winter coat, but I have a problem: my sleeves aren't too short, my arms are too long. I have had some success with sleeve length with small-sized plus-size coats, so I drove to the strip mall on the east side of Waterbury where Goddess was located. 

On the way, I passed another strip mall and noticed that Goddess was now in that strip mall, so I made a U-turn and went to the new Goddess location. Turned out that Goddess’ location was not the only thing that had changed, it was no longer a plus-size consignment shop! It was now a “chic boutique” and they had no coats, plus-sized or otherwise.

I was only about 10 minutes away from the Westfield Mall where there were three plus-sized clothing stores I have shopped at before: Fashion to Figure, Lane Bryant and Torrid, so Meriden, here I come! What a mistake! The Westfield Mall was so depressing. Lots of empty storefronts including Fashion to Figure, not to mention the long-gone Payless Shoes. Torrid had no coats and Lane Bryant had a limited unattractive selection. Macy’s had loads of coats, but each one I tried on had too short for me sleeves.

A little frustrated, I left the mall. The weather was now so miserable (cold and raining) that I decided to go home and that’s what I did.
     

Wearing JustFab

Femulating in the early 20th Century

A Quest for Perfect Hair

By Sally Stone

I remember so vividly the first time I wore a wig. It was one I "borrowed" from my Mom, a style that really didn't flatter me much. Still, it was a feminine hairstyle and I just couldn’t get over much it changed my appearance.

Way back then, my funds were minimal, so my access to wigs was limited making my acquisitions mostly opportunistic. Usually they were well-worn and often discarded by the original owner. In short, I was wearing wigs that were not particularly suited to my facial structure and skin tone. Of course, at the time, I knew little about the art of personalizing a hairstyle or about how to select the right wig.

Later, when I could afford to spend more, I made purchases mostly via mail order catalogs to avoid outing myself. When the Internet came along, ordering wigs got even easier, but like mail order, I was still making a wig purchase based on how it looked on the model in the catalog. Unfortunately, the wigs I ordered didn’t look nearly as good on me as they did on the model and in many cases, the wig I received bore little resemblance to the picture in the catalog. Obviously, it would have been much smarter to buy a wig in person from a salon where I could try it on and be fitted properly. At the time, however, I simply didn’t possess the courage or the confidence.

Eventually, I worked my way out of the closet and at some point, I forced myself to go to a salon for a wig fitting and purchase. And while it was clearly a much better method of purchase, the downside was the extra cost. On that first visit, the specialist fitted me with a beautiful blonde wig that really looked great, but it cost me well over $200. Because it was such a huge hit to my “girl” budget, I was forced to wear the wig for nearly four years, even though after only two years, it was already beginning to show its age. This is a typical failing of even the most well-made synthetic wigs, a fact that adds even more to the cost of maintaining a well-coiffed appearance.

Human hair wigs are an alternative to synthetic, but they are extremely expensive and require the same high-level of care and preparation as real hair. I did give thoughts to trying one, but the cost deterred me. The best solution, something I have always dreamed of, was to grow out my own hair. Unfortunately, that isn't currently a realistic option for me, so, synthetic wigs have always been my solution for maintaining a feminine hairstyle.

Since a hairstyle is such a powerful form of camouflage, choosing the right wig is critical. A wig can counter or at least soften masculine facial features, helping to feminize the appearance. I have discovered through trial and error that sometimes it is subtle wig characteristics that can make the most difference. The sweep or length of the bangs, the location of the part, the fall of the wig can each help to feminize a face. The trick is to find the characteristics that work best for individual facial features.

Whether online or in salons, I have spent a tremendous amount of money on wigs over the years and finding that perfect wig has always been elusive. However, five years ago, while searching online, I found a style called "Glow Girl” by Forever Young. Like Internet and mail order purchases from my past, I held out little hope the wig would end up being my go-to style. Additionally, the wig was priced at $29 and certainly, a wig this inexpensive couldn't possibly look as nice on me as it did in the online photo. Still, there was something about it that pushed me to buy it anyway.

Honestly, I was fully expecting to be disappointed when the wig arrived in the mail, but surprisingly Glow Girl proved to be the most flattering wig I'd ever owned. In fact, I was so happy with the way it looked on me that I ordered two more in slightly different shades. This particular purchased taught me that,while a challenge, it is possible to find a very nice wig without spending a fortune. Unfortunately, this discovery was mostly luck since I purchased it based on how it looked on the model instead of getting it fitted on me first.

Today, I own five Glow Girl wigs. The last two I purchased cost $39 and $49 respectively, but I still consider them bargains. All of my wigs are color variations of either blonde or red shades as they tend to flatter me best.

I learned something else interesting after acquiring my collection of Glow Girl wigs: each of them was slightly different. The differences were subtle, which didn't change the overall style, but the subtleties; how much curl, texture and fullness and the fall and length of the bangs gave each wig its own unique personality. I don't know if this is a quality control issue associated with this particular manufacturer or if the nature of wig construction generates slight variations in all wigs of the same style.

Owning multiple wigs allows me to rotate them, which significantly increases the amount of time it takes for any one of them to wear out. And these five wigs actually cost me less than a single high-priced salon wig would have making Glow Girl even more of a bargain. Rotation also allows me to vary my color choices from day to day, something I believe keeps my hairstyle looking fresh and new.

Finally, after so many years, I have satisfied my personal quest to find the perfect hairstyle at least for now. I must assume that as I age, the hairstyle I wear today may not suit an older me in the future. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, but for now I'm extremely happy with this style as it accentuates the feminine characteristics I possess very effectively.

I’m not trying to advocate for the style or the manufacturer of the wig I currently wear. That wouldn’t make sense, because a hairstyle that works for me may not be a good match for someone else. In fact, choosing a wig is an intensely personal choice and each of us has to pick a style and cut that best suits our feminine and dare I say it, our masculine characteristics.

Ultimately, I can't guarantee that someone else will be as lucky as me finding a go-to hairstyle. After all, it only took me 25 years, but there are beautiful, well-made wigs out there and they don’t need to break the bank.

Wearing Rachel Zoe (Source: Rachel Zoe)

Professional femulator Mr. Gene Chandler, circa 1965 

When Wigs Were Wigs

I bought my first wig from Frederick's of Hollywood. How about you?

(Source: Pinterest)

Veit Alex on the red carpet

Do blondes have more fun?

In response to my Ask Me Anything post, Pricilla sent me the following e-mail:

Hi Stana,

I have wondered why you chose to change your hair color from Blonde to Brown?? Don't Blondes have more fun!!!

You continue to look great.

Hugs,

Pricilla

Thank you for the question and the kind words!

I changed my hair color because I needed a change. (Isn't it a woman's prerogative to change her hair color?)

When I began seriously dressing as a woman, that is, not for a Halloween costume, I usually wore an red wig. Although my natural hair color was brown, I wore red because my parents always claimed that I was born a redhead and remained a redhead during my early years. So when I was choosing a wig color, I figured red might work since I started here as a redhead. Turned out that I liked myself as a redhead and wore various shades of red for years.

I finally went over to the light side in 2006 after hosting a support group meeting at a wig store (Tonkin's in Waterbury). As the hostess, I brought the snacks, played mother hen and had no intention of buying a new wig.

When the proprietor, Kathy Tonkin was finished bewigging the other girls, she said to me, "Your turn."

I thought, "What the heck" and told Kathy to work her magic on me.

Minutes later, she fitted a short blond wig on my head. When I looked in the mirror, I loved what I saw and I became a blonde.

I have been a blonde for the past 12 years... different shades of blonde, different hair styles, but always blonde. But I was getting a little bored with being a blonde and decided to try something different.

And so it goes.

Wearing Tibi blazer and skirt, L'Agence Daniella cami, Lente Danse bag (Source: ShopStyle.com)

Before and After (Source: Pinterest)

Good Hair Day

Wednesday, left home without girl clothes on. I usually don't dress driving the first leg of my Hamvention roadtrip so I can get on the road as early as possible and beat the commuters in the tri-state area.

Femulating for the trip would get me on the road about 90 minutes later. Yes, I could get up 90 minutes earlier, but at my age, I need 7 to 8 hours of sleep. Yes, I could go to bed 90 minutes earlier but that never works because I just lay awake for 90 minutes and fall asleep at my normal time. And so it goes.

Anyway, I femulated Thursday morning after waking up in a hotel on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border.

I packed three wigs for the long weekend: the blond wig from Noriko called "Sky" that I have been wearing almost every time I femulated in the past year, the same wig in a different color called Kahlua-Blast (a medium brown base with honey blonde highlights in the front) that I wore once and a new blond wig from Raquel Welch called "Salsa."

Thursday morning, I femulated with Salsa. The accompanying photo shows how I looked wearing a Dress Barn frock, Avon scarf, Payless pumps, gold jewelry and an array of unmentionables.

By the time I arrived at the my destination in Dayton, Ohio, five hours later, I decided that Salsa was not me. It was just too country music fangirlish for me, so I switched to the Kahlua-Blast wig and fell in love with the way it looked. It reminded me of Janet Leigh's hair in the film Bye Bye Birdie, which is a look that I always liked.

Besides liking how the wig looked, I discovered something obvious: your earrings are more visible. I lost count how many times I thought, "Why bother wearing gold or silver earrings when they get lost in the blondness of my wig?" Now,my pretty gold and silver earrings are very noticeable in contrast to a dark wig.

I wore the Kahlua-Blast wig the rest of the long weekend and it was a big success.

👩 👩 👩

I had very little time to get on the Internet last week and the e-mail piled up in my in-box. I promise to answer it all in the next few days.

Wearing Ann Taylor (Source: Ann Taylor)

Kacper Kuszewski femulates Maria Callas on Polish television's Your Face Sounds Familiar.