Modern hair combs are unusually simple tools—perhaps our simplest. Their single row of bristles, usually black, are designed to do one thing—separate and organize your hair follicles into a more attractive format.

They do this effectively, without the need of any electricity. And they’re cheap, too—you never have one when you need one, but you can buy a pack of 72 of them for eight bucks, or 11 cents each.

But even these simple devices carry an air of mystery. Specifically: Why does my comb need to announce itself as “unbreakable?” Does it matter these days? And, of course, has anyone successfully broken one?

The answer, it turns out, lies in the past, as it was the inventiveness of Charles Goodyear proved a turning point in American history, not just for combs, but for manufacturing. His 1843 discovery of the vulcanization process, which cured and toughened rubber in ways that made it a more useful material, was not an easy one to get to. His early efforts, according to Rubber: An American Industrial History, earned respect from major politicians like Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay, but his products struggled on the market and he at one point faced bankruptcy.
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But once he figured out his vulcanization process, Goodyear was in a position to reinvent numerous industries, with combs being near the top of the list.

(If you’re curious: Goodyear died nearly 40 years before the tire manufacturer named for him was created. And while there was also an industrialist named Charles W. Goodyear who came to prominence in the late 19th century, the vulcanized rubber inventor was unrelated.)
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At the time, combs tended to be made using fragile materials like bone, wood, and ivory, which, when dropped, could easily break. But Goodyear’s combs were different: Rubber wasn’t a shatter risk, of course, and it was also firm enough to be used while offering a degree of flexibility. The combs, at first, were not cheap, but according to Chauncey Depew’s 1895 book 1795-1895: One Hundred Years of American Commerce, Volume 2, they soon reinvented the market
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“Various kinds of so-called unbreakable combs have been offered to the public at different times, and the trade is cautioned against accepting any not bearing the gold stamp ‘Hercules,’ Warranted Unbreakable, on the one side, and The Butler Hard Rubber Co. in black on the other,” an ad for the device in American Druggist said in 1891.

It wouldn’t last, thanks to the eventual use in plastic, but there was a time when people thought of the word “Goodyear” and combs came to mind—rather than tires.
Eventually, though, the inevitability that was plastic came, and from the moment that John Wesley Hyatt, came up with one of the first usable plastics, celluloid, it was obvious where things were going. Hyatt was inspired by an 1863 contest that offered a $10,000 prize for anyone who could come up with a billiard ball that wasn’t made of ivory. Hyatt never came up with the billiard ball, but he soon was producing combs. In 1878, he was awarded a patent—one of many he would receive in his life—for “improvement in the manufacture of combs from celluloid.”

It makes sense that plastic combs quickly found a home on the market. The use case was perfectly matched for the type of material, for one thing, but it was also an object that was very easy to make and mold into a specific shape. When new types of plastic, such as nylon, appeared, combs often used the materials first.
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They also became more utilitarian, and less elaborate than the bone, wood, or ivory combs that had come before.

“With the rise of mass-production plastics, the fanciful decorative combs and faux ivory dresser sets so popular in the celluloid era gradually disappeared,” the author Susan Freinkel noted in a book excerpt on Scientific American. “Combs were now stripped to the most essential elements—teeth and handle—in service of their most basic function.”

And after World War II, a truly “unbreakable” material—polypropylene, a flexible plastic invented by two European scientists in the 1950s--quickly became the high watermark for plastics, and, ultimately, redefined the comb yet again.

A 1975 Philadelphia Daily News article, colorfully, highlights the way that combs became a difficult business to stick with. Clement A. Belusar, the marketing director of the then-recently shuttered Ajax Comb Company, broke down how the move to an “unbreakable” plastic permanently did in the company.

“Then came polypropylene and the unbreakable comb. Our downfall,” he explained. “The only time you had to replace a comb was when you lost it. And when you lost it, somebody else could find it and he wouldn’t have to buy one. We’re out of the business …”

I lose combs pretty often, so I assume that they should’ve just waited for me to be born.

“Oh wow, maybe it really is unbreakable.”
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Of the many unusual activities that can be found on YouTube, one of the weirdest involves a subsection of kids who feel compelled to test the claims of unbreakability parlayed by cheap modern combs picked up at such fine establishments as Sport Clips.

Some were successful, even unexpectedly so. Others weren’t so lucky.

(Fun discovery when watching some of these clips: In at least one instance, I ran into a pre-roll ad for Red Lobster highlighting its Crabfest—before, you know, watching someone bending a comb in a very similar way. They know.)

Of course, the truth of the matter is that combs were aiming for a very specific kind of unbreakability—the phrase refers to the fact that the teeth aren’t designed to fall out if you drop the device on the ground, not the idea that an 11-cent device would survive an endurance test.

We’re not talking Unbreakable in the M. Night Shyamalan sense here. Cheap combs don’t possess superpowers.

What they do possess, however, is the ability to reliably comb your hair.

​This history lesson is from Atlas Obscura

The '80s was a decade full of neon leg warmers, power ballads and big hair. But how did we get that big hair that was so bad it's good? A little bit of teasing and a lot of chemistry.
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Ms. Beautyphile helps us tackle the science behind perms and crimping and overall big '80s hair

​A lot happened in 1970, the Beatles disbanded, the US invaded Cambodia, Boeing 747 made its first commercial flight to London, and men in the UK began buying toupées in droves.

February 1970 marked the winter of bald men’s discontent, the Observer Magazinereports. In an issue devoted to ‘The Hair In Our Lives’ and illustrated with a bald Rudolf Nureyev, who in reality had a full head of hair, Maureen Green gets to the root (sorry) of the exponential boom in the male hair industry. ‘Because a man’s hair is so openly admired as an increasingly important part of an attractive appearance,’ she writes, ‘the onset of baldness causes more masculine dismay than ever. Baldness is a disfigurement.’

With such attitudes flying about, it’s no wonder men were seeking drastic measures to restore their follically ravaged heads. In 1970 alone the NHS provided £1m of wigs. One dermatologist told Green: ‘I’ve suggested to long-haired patients who are young and balding that they should become skinheads, but they are horrified. It’s worse than switching from modern jazz to swing. You just don’t do it.’

And it’s not just the NHS that was under strain; hairless men were turning to crime to disguise their gleaming scalps. ‘Just as in 18th-century London, a robber might lift an expensive wig from a fashionable head, so again wig makers and hairdressers are the victims of persistent burglary.’

However, a pioneering technique was about to shake things up: enter ‘hair weaving’, the process of ‘attaching extra hairs to those that still remain’.

According to Iain Kelly of the Hair Extension Centre, the psychological benefits blow those of the humble toupée out the water. ‘A man never sees himself as bald again. With a toupée, he takes it off at night and reminds himself. With extensions, he can be lost in his new hair. The boost to the male ego is immense.’ Thank goodness for that!

This article appeared on The Guardian

Show Highlights

• The low status of the barber profession in the 19th century
• The high status a black slave barber could gain in the white community
• The tensions that existed between black barbers and their white customers
• How one slave barber ended up financially supporting his master
• How freed black slave barbers became some of the wealthiest men in the African-American community
• The political influence many black barbers had in the Republican Party after the Civil War
• How black barbers created the luxury barbershop in the 19th century
• What black leaders like Frederick Douglass thought of successful black barbers
• The apprenticeship process the Knights of the Razors developed to train future black barbers
• How the apprenticeship system helped cement the centrality of the barbershop in the African-American community
• The successful black barbers who started the first insurance companies for African-Americans
• Why white men preferred to get their haircut by black barbers despite the influx of white European barbers in the late 19th century
• How state licensing in the late 19th century helped lead to the segregation of the barbershop
• How the invention of the safety razor contributed to the decline of the barbershop in the late 19th century
• Why the barbershop had a stronger toehold among African-American men than with white men
• And much more!

"balayage au coton"

 n.— «The shop has imported a young man named Yvan from the Carita salon in Paris to do what he calls a “balayage au cotton.” Starting at the nape, Yvan lifted out fine strands and applied a lightening paste with a thin brush. Instead of the usual foil wrapping, he tucked pieces of cotton wadding to support the strands in process and keep them from the rest of the hair. When he was three-quarters through, he had used 1,000 feet of cotton stripping and Miss Weston looked as though she were wearing an enormous white wig. The idea of the balayage (the word means sweeping) is to lighten fine strands of hair, rather than add color.»
“Color Your Hair Simply, or Turn It Blue—Salons Can Do It All” by Angela Taylor New York Times Apr. 1, 1974.

Balayage is the most exciting highlighting color technique to appear in a long time.  Colorists and clients alike fall in love with the fabulous results. Color placement looks natural and organic, similar to the effortlessly random color you'd receive after a summer at the beach.

 THE HISTORY OF BALAYAGE

Balayage (ba-lie-azhe), sometimes spelled ‘balliage’ or ‘baliage,’ is the art of hair painting. The term is based on the French word for ‘sweep away,’ or ‘balayer.’   Balayage, a.k.a “sweep away” originated at the exclusive gorgeous “Carita” Salon in Paris in the early 70’s making a huge name for itself with it’s beautiful and effortless sun kissed look.  There’s a link to the 1974 New York Times article above.  

Balayage is offered in many salons today—but not all results are consistent (it’s not as easy as it looks!). The colorist must be well-trained and have a keen sense of the hair’s texture and movement.  It’s just the colorist and the balayage brush. The most natural-looking results are usually those that look the most random, which calls for a very specific placement strategy.

In the 70’s, this technique was originally called “Balayage a Coton” for it’s use of cotton strips to separate the colored hair from the untouched portion. It was introduced during the time when our industry norm was frosting caps and solid colors, making the Balayage technique truly revolutionary for its time!  In the 80’s the industry introduced many varieties of foil highlighting techniques and it wasn’t actually until the early 90’s that Balayage first entered the US by storm grabbing the attention of top celebrities and became one of the hottest color trends to date!

It seems most clients that highlight their hair on a regular are almost afraid of stepping in to the world of balayage as it is something “new” to them and may seem like a big change.

There are many great reasons why Balayage is the top choice for highlights over the Foil technique!   When the hair is sectioned and “weaved or sliced” in to a foil, the whole section is saturated in color giving it a dense, uniform effect which gives it an unnatural appearance. Within weeks you start to see the regrowth or a “line of demarcation” and you are due for a retouch.

The Balayage technique is softly hand painted on the surface of the hair, leaving you with natural-looking swipes of color going from thick to thin and play off of the hairs natural movement.  Unlike traditional foil highlights, balayage lightens more slowly, which means there's less of a chance for breakage.   By choosing Balayage, you can go months without retouching and it gives that free flowing, untouched look.  It can be done with any variety of colors making it flexible for your wants and needs and makes it more manageable for your wallets!  A little something to think about before booking your next color service.  
      
NOT JUST FOR BLONDES
It’s important to note that balayage is definitely not just for blondes. Brunettes, redheads, even those with black hair can all take advantage of hair painting.  The results will be subtle, but they’ll add the dimension that everyone craves, giving a dark brunette swirls of cinnamon or caramel, for example.

FOILS VS. BALAYAGE
Foils often end up looking contrived - a neat row of uniform highlights.  When a section of hair is colored using a foil, the entire section is saturated with color resulting in dense, unnatural stripes of color.
 
Balayage color is painted in soft brush strokes across the surface of the hair, leaving you with natural-looking swipes of color that flow from thick to thin and play off the hair's natural movement.  Even better, balayage won't leave you with any signs of demarcation, creating a softer and more manageable grow-out.

FOILYAGE - the newest trend
This process marries the technique of Balayage with the vibrant color payoff of foil highlights. The traditional balayage technique involves painting onto the surface of the hair, completely freehand, but the process can be messy and may not lighten the hair enough.   Foilyage is a technique colorists use when they want to get more lift and can't achieve that with balayage so they go in and balayage inside the foil.  Foilyage uses this same hand-painting technique, but adds foil for added lightening.  In the end, you get nice natural-looking highlights.


Article Sources:
A Way with Words
Beauty, Head First
Maxine Salon - Chicago
Char Le Blanc - Salon & Spa
InStyle
GoodHousekeeping