downy
fuzzy (face or skin)
having unkempt or untrimmed facial hair (short of a mustache or beard)
unshaven, stubbly, stubbled, scraggy, bristly
having soft or delicate facial hair
downy
needing a shave
with five-o‘clock shadow
formed into curls or ringlets
curled, crimped
formed into small and tight curls
frizzed, frizzed out, frizzy
Next to Mary a small gaunt man was sitting, rigid and erect in his chair. In appearance Mr. Scogan was like one of those extinct bird-lizards of the Tertiary. His nose was beaked, his dark eye had the shining quickness of a robin’s. But there was nothing soft or gracious or feathery about him. The skin of his wrinkled brown face had a dry and scaly look; his hands were the hands of a crocodile. His movements were marked by the lizard’s disconcertingly abrupt clockwork speed; his speech was thin, fluty, and dry.
ALDOUS HUXLEY,
Crome Yellow
In the midst of this brown gloom Mr. Bodiham sat at his desk. He was the man in the Iron Mask. A grey metallic face with iron cheek-bones and a narrow iron brow; iron folds; hard and unchanging, ran perpendicularly down his cheeks; his nose was the iron beak of some thin, delicate bird of rapine. He had brown eyes, set in sockets rimmed with iron; round them the skin was dark, as though it had been charred. Dense wiry hair covered his skull; it had been black, it was turning grey. His ears were very small and fine. His jaws, his chin, his upper lip were dark, iron-dark, where he had shaved. His voice, when he spoke and especially when he raised it in preaching, was harsh, like the grating of iron hinges when a seldom-used door is opened.
ALDOUS HUXLEY,
Crome Yellow
ruffled and given more body by coming toward the scalp
teased, back-combed
combed up toward the top of the head
upswept, swept back, raked back
having certain strands bleached or colored
highlighted, streaked, frosted, tinted, lightened, darkened
given aligned soft waves (by means of heated curling irons)
marceled
dried (and usually given a fluffed shaping) with a blow dryer
blow-dried
straightened chemically
processed, conked, relaxed
cut in different lengths for a fuller look
layered
cut all one length
having a blunt cut
oiled
greased, slicked, slick, pomaded, brilliantined, plastered,
pasted
matted patches of hair
elflocks
lock hanging at the front of the head
forelock
groomed curl of hair displayed against the forehead or side of the face
spit curl
curled lock of hair
ringlet
tuft of hair growing awry or hanging over the forehead
cowlick
dampened curl held with a hairpin or clip
pin curl
twisted or intertwined length of hair
braid, plait
He was charmed by the pale face, the lissome figure, draped in pearl gray, with a coiled string of pearls at the throat.
THEODORE DREISER,
Sister Carrie
Miserable food, ill-timed and greedily eaten, had played havoc with bone and muscle. They were all pale, flabby, sunken-eyed, hollow-chested, with eyes that glinted and shone and lips that were a sickly red by contrast. Their hair was but half attended to, their ears anemic in hue, and their shoes broken in leather and run down at heel and toe.
THEODORE DREISER,
Sister Carrie
Captain Marpole’s grizzled head emerged from the scuttle. A sea-dog: clear blue eyes of a translucent truth-worthiness: a merry, wrinkled, morocco-coloured face: a rumbling voice.
RICHARD HUGHES,
A High Wind in Jamaica
Emily,
with her huge palm-leaf hat, and colourless cotton frock tight over her minute impish body: her thin, almost expressionless face: her dark grey eyes contracted to escape the blaze yet shining as it were in spite of themselves: and her really beautiful lips, that looked almost as if they were sculptured.
RICHARD HUGHES,
A High Wind in Jamaica
This was the first time I had seen Fletcher for nearly a year. He was a tall man who must once have been a handsome figure in the fine clothes he always wore and with his arrogant air and his finely chiseled face set off by his short-cropped black beard and brilliant eyes. Now a heaviness was setting in about his features and a fatty softness was beginning to show in his body.
JACK SCHAEFER,
Shane
tight braid usually worn down the back of the head
pigtail, rat’s tail, rat tail
cinched lock of hair hanging loosely down the back of the neck
ponytail
braid(s) worn flat against the scalp
cornrow
knot of hair worn at the back of the head
chignon, bun
knot of folded-under hair at the back of the head
French knot, French twist
knot of hair worn on the top of the head
topknot
wave set in lotioned or wet hair with a finger
finger wave
long and row-like braids as worn by Rastafarians
dreadlocks
single long lock worn on a bare scalp
scalp lock
attachable woman’s hairpiece for creating a hanging length of hair down
the back of the head
fall
any attachable thick strand of hair for a woman’s coiffure
switch
front down-hanging hair cut evenly across
bangs
woman’s conical coil of hair worn at the back of the neck
Psyche knot
roll of hair combed up from the forehead or temples
roach
curl or lock of hair worn in front of the ear, earlock
payess (Yiddish)
cylindrical roll of hair
puff
curl that is tubular
sausage curl
She heard the feet cross the diningroom, then the swing door opened and Luster entered, followed by a big man who appeared to have been shaped of some substance whose particles would not or did not cohere to one another or to the frame which supported it. His skin was dead looking and hairless; dropsical too, he moved with a shambling gait like a trained bear. His hair was pale and fine. It had been brushed smoothly down upon his brow like that of children in da- guerrotypes [sic]. His eyes were clear, of the pale sweet blue of cornflowers, his thick mouth hung open, drooling a little.
WILLIAM FAULKNER,
The Sound and the Fury
He was tall, gaunt and ill-formed, with a snake-like neck, terminating in a small, bony head. Under his close-clipped hair this repellent head showed a number of thick ridges, as if the skull joinings were overgrown by layers of superfluous bone. With its small, rudimentary ears, this head had a positively malignant look.
WILLA CATHER,
Death Comes for the Archbishop
Not much taller than the Bishop in reality, he gave the impression of being an enormous man. His broad high shoulders were like a bull buffalo‘s, his big head was set defiantly on a thick neck, and the full-cheeked, richly coloured, egg-shaped Spanish face—how vividly the Bishop remembered that face! It was so unusual that he would be glad to see it again; a high, narrow forehead, brilliant yellow eyes set deep in strong arches, and full, florid cheeks,—not blank areas of smooth flesh, as in Anglo-Saxon faces, but full of muscular activity, as quick to change with feeling as any of his features. His mouth was the very assertion of violent, uncurbed passions and tyrannical self-will; the full lips thrust out and taut, like the flesh of animals distended by fear or desire.
WILLA CATHER,
Death Comes for the Archbishop
curl that is spiral
corkscrew curl
coiffure in which the hair is chemically curled or waved
permanent wave, permanent, perm, cold wave
permanent wave that is looser and gives more body to the hair
body wave
coiffure in which the (curly or frizzy) hair is chemically straightened and
flattened or slightly waved
conk, process
coiffure in which the hair is slicked back from either side to meet or
overlap behind
ducktail, duck’s ass, DA
coiffure featuring spiky or irregularly chopped hair
punk
short and brush-like haircut
crewcut, butch, burr-cut
short and brush-like haircut with a flattened top
flattop
having a short haircut that makes one’s ears appear large
crop-eared
coiffure with a brush-like strip down the center of an otherwise shaved
head
Mohawk
coiffure in which the hair is a naturally round and bushy mass
Afro
coiffure in which the hair shape widens above the head to a flat top but is
progressively shorter (or “faded”) toward the ears
fade
woman’s coiffure in which the hair is cut in downward overlapping and
uneven layers
shag
woman’s coiffure in which the brushed-up hair appears as a full and loose
roll around the face
pompadour
Someone advanced from the sea of faces, someone tall and gaunt, dressed in deep black, whose prominent cheek-bones and great, hollow eyes gave her a skull’s face, parchment-white, set on a skeleton’s frame.
DAPHNE DU MAURIER,
Rebecca
He was a big, hefty fellow, good-looking in a rather flashy, sunburnt way. He had the hot, blue eyes usually associated with heavy drinking and loose living. His hair was reddish like his skin. In a few years he would run to fat, his neck bulging over the back of his collar. His mouth gave him away, it was too soft, too pink. I could smell the whisky in his breath from where I stood.
DAPHNE DU MAURIER,
Rebecca
The eyes—and it was my destiny to know them well—were large and handsome, wide apart as the true artist’s are wide, sheltering under a heavy brow and arched over by thick black eyebrows. The eyes themselves were of that baffling protean gray which is never twice the same; which runs through many shades and colorings like intershot silk in sunshine; which is gray, dark and light, and greenish gray, and sometimes of the clear azure of the deep sea. They were eyes that masked the soul with a thousand guises, and that sometimes opened, at rare moments, and allowed it to rush up as though it were about to fare forth nakedly into the world on some wonderful adventure,—eyes that could brood with the hopeless sombreness of leaden skies; that could snap and crackle points of fire like those which sparkle from a whirling sword; that could grow chill as an arctic landscape, and yet again, that could warm and soften and be all a-dance with love-lights, intense and masculine, luring and compelling, which at the same time fascinate and dominate women till they surrender in a gladness of joy and of relief and sacrifice.
JACK LONDON,
The Sea Wolf
woman’s coiffure in which the hair is cut short and evenly all around the
head
bob
woman’s coiffure in which the short cut is neither layered nor graduated
blunt cut
woman’s coiffure in which the hair is cut irregularly short toward the face
and with the ears exposed
pixie, French cut
woman’s coiffure in which the hair is teased for a puffed-out look
bouffant
woman’s conical coiffure
beehive
woman’s coiffure with a rounded or cap-like top that is tapered at the
back of the neck
mushroom
woman’s coiffure in which the usually shoulder-length hair is combed
down and turned under or inward at the ends in a roll
pageboy