A Guide to Vintage Waves: Is it a Finger Wave? Are they Hollywood Waves?

Your Guide to Vintage Waves: Finger Waves? Hollywood Waves? Are they 1920s? What about Rita Hayworth waves?

The first step you must take to styling your best vintage waves… is to identify the wave you are picturing.

Is it a Finger wave? Is it a Hollywood wave? What do these terms even mean?

Let this be your guide…

Because these terms actually do refer to specific hairstyle versions. And it seems that everyone is crossing the streams on how to describe the way they want their hair waved.

• What really makes these waves different?
• Marcel and Other Curling Iron Waves
  • Croquignole (Figure 8) Curl
• Finger Waves
  • Other Water Waves
• Pin Curl Waves
  • Skip Waves
• Hollywood Waves
• Communicating with your Client/Hairstylist

The real difference among vintage waves…

I am not a purist about vintage waves. I just love them in all forms. But I am a hairstylist who strives to style client’s hair to what they envision. So understanding the difference between vintage wave styles is a very important part of my hairstyling tool kit.

The original technique or method used to style waves is where most looks got their names. One example of this is the Marcel wave, named after French hairstylist François Marcel who created his technique in the 1870s. Another is finger waves which are created with the help of the stylist’s fingers.

The problem with these names comes from misinterpretation about a hairstyle. When someone says they want a finger wave, but what they are really picturing is a pin curl wave, à la Rita Hayworth, then you can see where the hairstyle goal break down leads to disaster.

I’m going to get a little technical here, but this is what I think is the best way to get everyone closer to their ideal vintage hairstyle.

Marcel Wave and Other Classic Curling Iron Techniques

Hair waves have been around for hundreds of years, but the sort of OG vintage wave that had an actual name is the Marcel wave. Creator François Marcel used the common Victorian curling tongs in the 1870s to create a pattern of deep arcs and peaked ridges.

The technique was so famous that we hairstylists still call the springless curling iron style he used in the Victorian time period a “Marcel curling iron”

The technique involves burnishing a pattern of waves in a section of hair by “crimping” curling tongs over and under the hair and only slightly turning them at various points… and at the same time… using the teeth of a comb to pull the hair in an opposite direction to carve out the arc of the wave and define the ridge.

As the curling tongs operator works down the hair section, the tongs are held at different positions and the comb is pulled in different directions to carve out undulating arcs and ridges switching back and forth down the hair.

This technique was a popular waving technique well into the 1920s while it was popular to have the most even, constant wave pattern that would travel from one side of the face, back around the head to the opposite side of the face.

Croquignole Marcel Curl (Figure 8 Curl)

The croquignole marcel curl was a popular curling iron (tong) technique in the 1930s. It created fast, deep waves similar to a marcel wave, but without the time consuming task of marking every ridge and arc one at a time like marcel waving.

It’s really a beautiful waving technique and can be used in recreating hairstyles from the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s.

The earliest mention of the croquignole marcel curl I can find is in a beauty school book from the 1930s. The book claims the technique was an old technique (older than the 1930s book origin). We know it more commonly in the beauty industry today as the Figure 8 curl.

Rather than trying to explain this technique of wrapping the hair around the curling iron in a figure 8 shape, I’ll direct you to a video I have on YouTube showing the figure 8 curl waving technique in action.

Finger Waving

Finger waving is a technique using fingers and a comb to carve the arcs and ridges of waves into the hair. It was a common styling technique in the 1920s .

It involves first wetting the hair completely and adding a styling lotion or gel to give it hold and make the hair more pliable. The fingers are used to hold the shape, while the comb is used to comb the arcs and push the ridges of the hair into place.

Finger waves has become the most common term I hear when someone is looking for a vintage wave hairstyle. But, usually, it is the last way any of my clients want their hair actually styled.

The style is beautiful and I love it, but because the waves of this wet set style have so little volume, it makes many women today feel like they have no hair. When a client is looking for this 1920s hairstyle feel, I usually style using the figure 8 curl or a flat wrap barrel curl combed into a wave like a pin curl wave.

Water Waving After the Flapper

Finger waving remained a common hairstyle technique well after the 1920s, but with the decline in the popularity of flapper style, the wave evolved during the 1930s into what I would describe more as water waving. Replacing the long, linear and repetitive style of the 1920s, water waving combined soft curls and organic shaping.

The waves were still formed partially with the finger waving technique, but the combination of arcs leading into curls created a softer texture to the hairstyle. And as you can see these hairstyles, and the finger wave pictures before, are all from 1930. There was overlap in these hair trends.

This style of water waving 1 or 2 arcs close to the scalp and then pin curling past that point remained a technique used in hairstyling into the 1940s and 1950s.

Pin Curl Waves (The 1940s Wave)

The pin curl wave was most popular in the 1930s and 1940s, but use of the styling technique continued into the 1960s. In the 1940s, pin curls were used to create a fuller, softer wave from the slick down wave popularized by 1920s flappers.

Pin curls, when they are set evenly in rows, can be brushed into waves. In my blog post, A 1947 4-Pin-Curl Formula for Vintage Waves, I bring to you a pin curl wave styled by famed movie hairstylist Carmen Dirigo on actress Ann Blyth. Below are a few images illustrating how this wave comes together.

The same type of curl pattern can be done with a curling iron or with sponge rollers. The size of the curling iron will determine the level of wave. Just be sure to clip the curls in place and let them cool before brushing them out.

Skip Wave

The skip wave, another pin curl wave technique, is created with 2 rows of pin curls set in opposite direction of each other. One row set in a clockwise curl and the other set counterclockwise, or visa versa.

When these curls are brushed out, it creates a deep wave. These curls can be set in any different direction allowing for waves traveling any direction on any part of the hairstyle.

The skip wave curl set was used for many hairstyles in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s.

The below images from my book Vintage Hairstyling: Retro Styles with Step-by-Step Techniques illustrates the skip wave pattern. You can see how the directional change of each pin curl contributes to the wave shape.

In the Primrose Pin Curl Set on YouTube, I do a full hairstyle using the skip wave and show the brush out to create this classic hairstyle.

Hollywood Waves

The Hollywood Wave is a contemporary interpretation of the long, glamorous waves of the 1940s. You can identify them by the repetitive arc and ridge pattern on very long hair.

There are slight variations between how hairstylists create a Hollywood wave, but it almost always uses a specific twisting action while hair is wound from the base to the ends onto a curling iron.

The most important ingredient to successful Hollywood waves is consistency in curling. Each piece needs to be curled the same as the one before it. Unlike waves from basic wrap curls, Hollywood wave curls can’t be force brushed into shaped. They need to be shaped properly at curling, so they can fall into the even wave effortlessly.

Talking to your Client. Talking to your Hairstylist.

Identifying these different waves gets you so much closer to the wave goal. Use pictures, use technique lingo, and use schedule and timing expectations to help you design the best vintage waves.