For as long as I have had hair, I have had straight across bangs. It has become a part of my identity that I can't even imagine living without (especially considering how pale my forehead is after 21 years of being covered up). Naturally because of my own comfort with the look of straight bangs, I tend to be drawn to/identify with style icons who also share this same look. While contemporary hair heroes come and go with the fickle wind of changing fads and the weird invention of hair extentions, there was a time when a hairstyle was a statement.
1960's French film and ye-ye music icon Francoise Hardy is one of my favorite examples of the straight hair & straight bang combo. Always stylish and elegant, Hardy mixed in the influential circles of British rock royalty (by being personal friends with The Rolling Stones), and the American folk scene (seen as a muse for Dylan in the early stages of his career).
Beyond her ability to rekindle my love affair with my own haircut, I love Francoise because of her ability to look great with minimal amounts of makeup or styling. Of course she was dressed beautifully (always looking sharp with straight leg pants, pull over sweaters, button up shirts, and successfully being able to pull off a leather jacket), but she never looked artificial. Mixing class with comfortability is something that I strive to achieve in the same vein of Hardy's classic looks.
Clean lines, solid colors, and minimalism is something that Hardy embodies beyond her garment choices. In a decade defined by large dark eyes and multiple layers of eye shadow and fake eyelashes, Hardy's fresh face and less is more approach to eyeliner allows her to continue to be considered worthy of fashion and style worship even while mod / sixties fashion seems to flux in and out of date (it seems to recycle every three years if you really pay attention).
Sometimes the times gets the best of all of us...
