Hair clips and headbands are the hottest trends for spring – here’s why
This season is all about adding some razzle dazzle to your hair, writes Olivia Petter
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Your support makes all the difference.There’s a new way to accessorise this season, and it’s going to do wonders to your next bad hair day.
Hair clips and headbands are in the midst of one of the most impressive sartorial renaissances yet, having matured from kitsch school girl accessories of childhood years to devastatingly cool and sophisticated adornments worn by the likes of Alexa Chung and Bella Hadid.
Demand for hair accessories is higher than ever before, with sales up by 250 per cent on luxury online retailer Net-a-Porter in the last year, with designers Jennifer Behr and Prada leading the way in terms of sell-out styles.
And if the autumn/winter 2019 runways are anything to go by - with statement barrette clips and pearly tiaras injecting some pizazz at Ashley Williams and Simone Rocha - this a trend that’s not going anywhere soon.
“Hair accessories are having a real moment,” says celebrity stylist Alex Longmore, who tells The Independent they boast both sartorial and economical appeal.
“I think it’s partly to do with brand accessibility and the current financial climate,” she explains.
“Customers might not want to splurge on an item of clothing but a hair accessory from a named brand is a fraction of the price meaning its much more accessible.”
Of course, modest price tags are not the only factor at play here. As design history lecturer Dr Harriet Atkinson of the University of Brighton points out, hair accessories have been around for centuries, and their recent resurgence might speak to the industry’s increasing penchant for nostalgia.
“Eighteenth century hair adornments ranged from ribbons and jewels to flowers and even stuffed animals,” she tells The Independent. “The Victorians held their hair in place with combs, some of them ornate, carved bone.”
Atkinson notes that the rise of padded velvet headbands in particular, as seen everywhere from collections by Los Angeles-based designer Sophie Buhai to Urban Outfitters, is part of the wider eighties revival that has emerged in fashion over the last year.
There’s also something undeniably sentimental about decorating your hair with sparkling clips and headbands you might well have worn as a child, or during your early teens in a bid to channel Blair Waldorf, the famous Gossip Girl character for whom headbands were very much a trademark aesthetic.
This association was particularly noticeable at Simone Rocha's autumn/winter 2019 London Fashion Week show, which felt like a sartorial ode to innocence.
Models with rose-tinted cheeks of all ages walked the runway wearing sparkling beaded tiaras and jewelled barrettes.
A quick look at the runway of full-skirted, tulle girlish gowns (that came in pastel pinks, vivid reds and virginal whites) and it appeared as if Rocha’s models had raided their childhood dressing up boxes and become princesses for the day.
“The idea was to continue the embellishment from the Ready-to-Wear collection into the head, creating a full silhouette,” Rocha tells The Independent. “The pieces engage with the connotations of femininity of the classic hair band shape.”
That’s not to say that all hair clips are delicate and demure. Adding some attitude to the trend is the rise of empowering slogan barrettes, which bear words like “Boss” and “Babe”. You can now find these across the high street, with options at New Look, Pretty Little Thing and Accessorize.
Now the ultimate "cool girl" accessory, statement hair clips are often seen tucked into the well-groomed strands of some of the fashion industry’s major players, including model Adwoa Aboah and blogger Susie Lau. But this is largely down to one designer in particular, Ashley Williams, whose silver diamante “GIRLS” and “BOYS” pins have become a thing of mythic adoration among the fashion set.
“When I first made the hair clips it was a way of experimenting with jewellery and I felt hair accessories were something that was missing at the time,” Williams tells The Independent.
“It was a call back my childhood in the 1990s when maximum hair accessories were very cool,” she added.
But creating something that is so desirable - the pins almost always sell out on Williams’ website - has its drawbacks, the designer explains, with counterfeit styles emerging on a weekly basis.
“It’s interesting to see that this was clearly something missing from the market,” she adds, “and look how people have responded".
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