Beards
Kit Harington (Game of Thrones) on the cover of GQ this year
Big bushy, smooth furry, patchy, pointy, oiled, curled and swooshing. Beards — big ones or neat ones — are the facial fashion for dandies these days. It’s so much fun. And maybe the biggest change in men’s fashion since bell-bottoms.
Jamie Dornan on the cover of Details
Neptune is, of course, the planet of fashion, and since early 2011, the god of the seas has been in his own sign, which rules the sailors, romantic yearning, fantasy: Game of Thrones and Liam Hemsworth’s sweater, perhaps. Those Scandinavian chunky knits certainly say hello sailor.
Liam Hemsworth on the cover of Esquire
Neptune was last in Pisces throughout the 1850s, and indeed that was exactly when big beards came into fashion last time. In Paris, la vie boheme was in full swing and part of showing how wild and free you were was wearing scrappy whiskers. Here is Gustav Courbet — always a trendsetter — in a self portrait painted as Neptune went into Pisces in 1848.
Detail of Gustav Courbet self-portrait
Big beards became widely popular with the Crimean War 1854-56 — in present-day Ukraine. Normally soldiers were expected to be clean shaven, but it got so cold and there were no razors anyway.
Sergeant John Geary, Thomas Onslow and Lance Corporal Patrick Carttay, 95th Regiment (Derbyshire) Regiment of Foot, wearing their packs and equipment. The 95th Regiment won eight Victoria Cross awards in the Crimea
Soon everyone was growing whiskers. The fashion spread and beards were the thing for the next 50 years or so, until they became something that old men wore.
Leo Tolstoy, colour photograph taken by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky in 1908
I wonder if we’ll have a repeat of the Victorian beard thing and they’ll become the norm for the next few decades. Or is fashion more fickle? Are we heading for this?
Harry Wentworth Monk by William Holman Hunt.
PS The other (slight) street-fashion trend I’ve noticed since Neptune in Pisces is blue hair. What will Poseidon think of next?
You are the second post I have read of the correlation of Neptune in Pisces with beards and I have been noticing quite a lot these last few years. Lately, as Neptune proceeds in his swim through Pisces, these beards are becoming bigger and bigger, move savage and untamed. The fashion here in Italy is having all one’s hair shaven and go with a corpulent beard. My question is: why is Neptune in Pisces related to beards?
I think it’s to do with 1. looking like a sailor, 2. bohemianism BUT the other people who have big bushy beards are the jihadis who are, of course, religious fanatics — also Neptune.
I think it’s also an expression of raw masculinity and individualism, which you might associate more with Aries in Uranus, so it’s the two energies combining really. In this country, you’re not allowed a beard in the army or airforce, and in the navy it’s the full beard or nada. So it’s also an anti-military statement.
I know for sure that in Malta it is like in UK as regards beards in the military. Besides jihadis, all extremely traditional religious movements starting with the christian monks had beards and the the more extreme the tradition was in the monks’ order, the more savage became the beard. Not the mention Jews, Sikhs and Amish.
Shall we also see women leaving their body hair on?
Odd you bring that up! As I was reading the post, I thought, “Like women not shaving in the “70’s, when Neptune was in wild Sagittarius.”
I never liked beards. If a man really wants some hair on his face I prefer a simple mustache, but am not a fan of that either ! What planet is that Christina ??
mimi
I haven’t thought about that one yet. Last time moustaches were in (here anyway) was in the 1970s, or for gay men the 1980s. That would put Neptune in sag, then cap. I’d have to dig a bit further though.
I think most men who have moustaches are Leo or Scorpio, Taurus or Aquarius !
I
mimi
a fixed sign sign?
I guess !
mimi
I was going to write : I like them most !
mimi
Ha I have Mars sq Nep and I have a weakness for bearded men, my father with his Moon conj. Nep of course had one. Thanks for this!
Oh I’m having fun with this post. I was seeing a lot of nice (uhm, quite nice) bearded men in the past few months until I realized it was a trend. I know of two (mustache or beard) guys that have venus in scorpio and some fixed in their charts for sure. Aries comes to mind as well. And then there’s Aquarius Tom Selleck.
[…] things with their hair too — and, of course, the hello-sailor look was quite the thing… and beards. Ladies’ hair was parted in the middle with poofy side-wings and braiding was […]