Adorned
Gajra flowers, hair jewellery, beads, combs, pins and the maang tikka. 22 hairstyles on EveryHairstyle so far.
Hair has been adorned with flowers, pins, combs, beads and jewels in almost every culture. In South Asia the gajra, a garland of jasmine, is worn on buns and plaits every day and at weddings. Japan has kanzashi, Korea the binyeo and the daenggi ribbon, West Africa cowrie shells and amber in Fulani braids, and Europe the tiara and the jewelled comb.
Flowers and jewels in South Asia
Jasmine gajras are strung fresh each morning and sold at temple gates, wound around a jooda or along a choti. Brides wear many strands, and South Indian brides and dancers fit a jadanagam, a row of jewelled ornaments, along the plait. In North India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, the maang tikka hangs on the parting with a pendant on the forehead, and in Punjab a tasselled paranda is woven into the end of the plait.
Pins, combs and beads
In Japan, kanzashi pins and lacquered combs decorated the traditional nihongami; Kyoto's maiko change them with the seasons. Married Korean women fixed their buns with a long binyeo, while unmarried people tied their braids with a daenggi ribbon. In West Africa, beads, cowries, amber and silver coins decorate braids and have shown wealth and status. European tiaras and jewelled combs were signs of rank and are still worn by brides.
Famous adorned hairstyles
Still to be written: Tiara.
Further reading
Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Binyeo: Unknown author, Public domain, source
- Kanzashi: Anonymous ( Japan ) Unknown author, Public domain, source
- Daenggi: Korean_Folk_Village-Women_in_hanbok-02.jpg : parhessiastes, CC BY-SA 2.0, source
- Hair stick: Unknown author, Public domain, source
- Punjabi paranda: Biswarup Ganguly, CC BY 3.0, source