"Alsatian House Of Hair & Beauty" is an institution in Zurich. Since 1929, "the latest trend hairstyles" or the "unique, sensational look for special occasions" have been staged here, right on Paradeplatz. So it is still on the homepage today.
And that's the way it was decades ago, as a book published in Edition Patrick Frey shows. "Fünf Finger Föhn Frisur" is the name of the simply designed band, which has assembled a collection of 6x6 rollfilm recordings by photographer Peter Gaechter, which he has made together with his studio partner Bettina Clahsen since the 1970s until the nineties for the Zurich hairdresser.
photo gallery
9 pictures
Short, half-length, long: Hairstyle trends from three decadesThe shootings took place twice a year - with two models each and several hairdressers. The resulting images were finally deducted by hand, retouched and presented to the customers of the noble hairdresser in high-quality textbooks.
No amateur aesthetics, no strategic trash
The compiled black and white and color photographs can be read as a walk through the younger hair fashion. In the seventies, when still very classic, elegant women's cuts prevailed, the spirit of the times soon broke: Hairstyles with names like "Cold War Kids", "Punk" or "70s-Charlies-Angels-Fransen" illustrate how popular culture is also in the Switzerland arrived - hairstyles as a mirror of social change.
more on the subject
Jörg Scheller writes in his text about a "Hairdressing change of the public" to the book. In it he explains how the taste of the "ladies of the upscale Zurich society" gradually changed: "In the eighties and nineties, this bourgeoisie, still comparatively strongly represented in Switzerland, slowly but surely competed with the emphatically casual giving 'Thrashing the consumerism with the trash.'
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25.09.2019, 17:04 clock
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DISPLAY
Peter Gaechter, Bettina Clahsen
Five fingers hair dryer hairstyle
Publishing company:
Edition Patrick Frey
Pages:
224
Price:
EUR 60,00
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Today, such hairstyle photographs look very different. On the other hand, if we look at these historical pictures, we notice a great mastery of the photographic craft. Marked by care and precision, the photography for Gaechter and Clahsen (Gaechter had been trained at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Zurich, Clahsen at the Folkwangschule in Essen) was not a field of experimentation, but extremely elegant arts and crafts. "No snapshots, no sought-after amateur aesthetics, no strategic trash" - how beneficial to look at these perfectly illuminated heads against a neutral background, which do not want to be anything more than simply perfected craftsmanship.
Once again, reference is made to the successful book design by "Büro 146" by Valentin Hindermann, Maike Hamacher and Madeleine Stahel. A wonderful photo book! 800 copies there are only of it - unconditional buy recommendation, even for people who just do not need a new haircut.
