This is a lovely, "girlie" book to read for two reasons: one, it provides light reading that will help you take your mind off your troubles, and secondly (and most importantly) it will help you learn the rules to properly take care of your hair, while in the meantime learning to play with it and, above all, have fun.
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The book starts introducing four friends: ultra-urban and college graduate Polly, and her funky friends and roommates Jaz, Kate and Laura. The four of them have totally different personalities and likes. They all live in New York's stylish Tribeca district, in close proximity to fashionable Soho. A fifth friend comes to stay with them for a while - sexy kitten Chrissie. Throughout the different chapters, the girls share nights out, trips to exotic worldwide locations and spa retreats, while concentrating on how to improve their image and give a boost to their lives and personalities; with statements accentuated by the way they wear their hair. This may seem callous enough as it sounds, and it is true that I myself did not believe until recently that hair is indeed, in the words of Charles Worthington himself, one's "most important fashion accessory" (page 5). Indeed, if our mane does not have a clean cut and it does not look shiny and healthy, a face full of make up or even designer clothes will just not do the trick of presenting us to the world as sharp and well... in control of our own destiny.
This is where UK-based Charles Worthington comes in with this sort of bible-like book, which is divided into four main sections:
- "City hair", gives an introduction to the basics of hair care on a daily basis.
- "Big date hair", with tips for very special occasions.
- "Vacation hair", offering a wealth of information about how to sport a fantastic mane while getting plenty of R&R.
- "Big day hair", with a special chapter on suggestions for weddings, as well as the most incredible styles for different attitudes and occasions. Some of the styles are so funky and unusual that I wanted to get married all over again just to try them (!)
Personally, I've gained an enormous amount of knowledge about hair care and how to manipulate it - instead of being manipulated by it - after reading this book. Even when some of the do's may just be a tad too complicated to create at home, the lavish photographs and step by step instructions are enough for any stylist to recreate at a salon - and I can already see myself taking the book to my stylist and asking her to perform the different styles on me; and in my next trip to London, a visit to The House of Charles Worthington, in posh Belgravia, is "de rigueur" for me.
The book is also an excellent glossary of the different products available today in the industry designed to make hair your friend instead of your enemy, pinpointing the differences in usage of the large variety of styling products in the market, from mascaras that add lively color to our bangs and hair buns used to create the most perfect chignons and updo's. But the best thing one can do with a book like this is to gather the necessary elements and start trying out the possibilities, which are no doubt, as endless as they are dramatic, unusual yet stylish.