Historic Hood River
Hairwork
Notes
Grace’s museum object selection for today takes us to an unusual (and slightly creepy?) corner of the art world:Â Victorian hairwork:
This artwork shows a wonderful example of Victorian hairwork, framing an 1860s engraved portrait of George Washington and his family. The pointe tress hair wreath predates 1900 and has been a recorded part of the museum’s collection since at least the 1940s, but likely entered the collection earlier. While artwork made from human hair has existed for many centuries, the Victorian Period (1837-1901) saw hairwork flourish as an art form.
Throughout the Victorian period, hairwork was often used to make jewelry or decorative artworks such as this wreath. The purpose of hairwork, aside from its visual appeal, was often for use in mourning practices, but just as often, it was used to make family trees and tokens of friendship.Â
While we don’t know the source of the hair, or why it is framing a portrait of the Washington family, or precisely how it ended up in the collection, we know that it showcases great talent and an intimate connection between the artist, the source, and the medium of their craft.
This isn’t the only human hair we have in our collection. We have a lock of Samuel Blythe’s hair in an envelope along with his correspondence.
Thorn
I don’t know why, but there’s something about human hair artifacts, they kinda creep me out. Maybe creep is too strong a word, more like a mild case of the heebie-jeebies. (Btw, “Heebie-jeebies” was coined by cartoonist Billy Debeck in his 1923 comic strip, Barney Google, then popularized by a Louis Armstrong hit. Yet, the comic strip name has no relation to the modern Google, which was a misspelled domain search for “googol”, but where I now easily searched for and found a great NPR interview explaining a 3000 piece Victorian hair artifact collection.
https://www.npr.org/2025/12/08/nx-s1-5606353/finding-new-homes-for-an-unusual-hair-museums-artifacts
L.E.
Going through an old trunk one time, there was a saved lock of reddish gold hair, which had belonged to a girl who had died in her teens. Yes, it creeped me out.
But, I wonder if it was a common way to preserve a bit of a loved one who was gone. There was a time when families did not have photos of their children, so, was this a way to remember them?
Ellen M Shapley
I still have a lock of my red gold hair that my mother saved probably from my first haircut. I haven’t made it into an art piece…yet.