Just so you know, vintage hair dryers looked like something out of a sci-fi movie
Going to the hair salon is usually a pretty relaxing experience. You get to have your hair washed, head massaged, you can read a few magazines and then leave looking fresh, lighter and ready for some serious Instagram action. What’s not to love about that? The answer is nothing. There’s nothing not to love about that. But as it turns out, hair salons haven’t always been so, uh, easy going.
Mashable alerted us to some pretty alarming retro hair dryers that were used between 1928 and 1948. Usually retro things are pretty cool and worth spending lots of money on, but kinda terrifying hair-sucker contraptions that look like they’re straight out of a sci-fi movie? Noooo thanks.
Have we piqued your interest about hair dryers? THOUGHT SO. Here’s some hair dryer 101: The first ever hair dryer was invented in 1890 by Alexander F. Godefroy in his salon in France. It combined a seat with a hood connected to a gas stove. The client/victim would sit underneath the hood while a hand crank blew hot hair from the stove over her head. Sometimes variations included heated coils in place of the helmet part. Sound intense? It definitely seems to have been. But it worked, so the hair hood dryer became a staple in hair salons everywhere.
The first handheld hair dryer patent was given in 1911, but the hair dryer didn’t have the most efficient design. The air it blew out was basically room temperature, the dryer was super heavy and it electrocuted people — which was slightly more than just a minor problem. So, salon’s stuck with Godefroy’s design until the 1970s, when handheld hair dryers became easier to use and a lot safer — by not electrocuting people and what not.
Here are some more vintage hair dryers that we are all probably pretty happy we don’t have to deal with:
To see more old-school hair-dressers that may or may not give you goosebumps, go here. You are welcome.
(Images via Twitter, iStock, Shutterstock, Instagram)
