Never before, like in the nineteenth century, was so demonstrated that the hair may be the outward expression of our thoughts. In the first half of the century, the literary movement, which later would become a way of thinking, was the Romanticism. This word is more related with a philosophical tendency than with a love feeling. It was the complete opposition to the ideas of the Age of Enlightenment; the other extreme of the logical rationalism of the 18th century. Romantic literature is fantastic, ideal, far from the everyday reality. The eighteenth century's rationalism believed in a world driven by mechanical laws into a universe what they thought was a smooth running machine; in an artificial life concentrated in cities; they felt that they were living in the best of all possible worlds. Romanticism discovers mystery everywhere; is irrational, conflicted and dubitative; it prefers the solitude, the melancholy of nostalgic feelings; it prefers the Nature and the release of social structures. The supreme authority will not more be the Reason, but, instead, the individual imagination. And the hair, in the first half of the century, was that way: disordered, dry, natural, with no artificial products, with no ostentation; an expression of the sense of individual freedom and a suggestion of "not-belonging" to anything previously uniformed. From the classical models of the Greek aesthetic, at the end of the 18th century, they jumped to an encounter with the medieval aesthetic. Romanticism accepts with more pleasure the mysteries of the obscurantism than the rationalist explanations of the Enlightenment. In the first years of the 19th century men wore this kind of "open-mind" hairstyle, and beards and moustaches were rarely seen.

Women hairstyle was, at the times of the Napoleonic Empire, which coincided with the Georgian and the Regency in Great Britain, -the first decade of the century-, a neo-classic style inspired in Ancient Greece hairstyles. This style was characterized by using curls on the forehead and above the ears, and the hair held with a knot or a chignon at the back of the neck. Hairstyles were usually adorned with ribbons, head bands or diadems. Near 1820 they started to wear the hair parted in the center and pulled back smoothly toward the back. At this time every woman wore a hat or a bonnet in public places. Those hairstyles were also called "Jane Austen's hairstyles", because of the popularity of her stories, like the famous "Pride and Prejudice" from 1813. 

The Queen Victoria of England ruled from 1837 to 1901. This period was called "Victorian Age" because of the particular characteristics it have had. It was an age of energy, with a huge industrial and economic expansion, in which Britain held the position of world leadership, with the biggest colonial Empire. The Victorian moral was of straight and solid principles. Hairstyles were successively changing during different moments of this period. Men, since 1840 until approximately 1865, wore their hair more or less long, and became in fashion big moustaches, sideburns, and beards. Also was "à la mode" the puritan hairstyle of the 19th century, with no moustaches, and sideburns attached to a short beard, like Abraham Lincoln.

Eliza Rossana Gilbert, Countess of Landsfeld, was better known by her artistic name Lola Montez. She was born in Ireland in 1820 and died in 1861. She was a famous dancer and courtesan in the court of Ludwig I of Bavaria, who made her countess of Landsfeld. She published in 1858, "The arts of beauty; or secrets of a lady's toilet, with hints to gentlemen, on the art of fascinating". The book contained recipes for dying gray hair, like this one : "10 grams of gallic acid, 1 ounce of acetic acid y 1 ounce of tincture of sesqui-chloride of iron ". Dissolve the gallic acid in the tincture of sesqui-chloride of iron, and then add the acetic acid. Before using this preparation, the hair should be thoroughly washed with soap and water. A great and desirable peculiarity of this dye is that it can be so applied as to color the hair either black or the lighter shade of brown. If black is the color desired, the preparation must be applied when the hair is moist, and for brown it shall not be used until the hair is perfectly dry. The way to apply the compound is to dip the points of a fine tooth comb into it until the interstices are fill with the fluid, then gently draw the comb through the hair, commencing at the roots, till the dye has perceptibly taken effect. When the hair is entirely dry, oil and brushes it as usual ". The book contained, besides, recipes and methods for all the aspects of feminine beauty, and some recommendations for gentlemen. 

"The arts of beauty; or secrets of a lady's toilet, with hints to gentlemen, on the art of fascinating" by Lola Montez; Harvard College Library, 1891

Women, in 1840, and until 1860, wore chignons at the top of their heads, combining chignons with locks falling at either side of the face. They adorned their hair with combs, flowers, leaves, pearls, or jeweled ribbons. They used to comb their, also, parted in the center and tied to the nape with a knot. Near 1860 chignons at the nape became of very popular use. Curls framing the hair were common around 1850. Curls and waves, after 1860, were generally used, and they used metallic hair curlers at the night time to preserve the shape of their curls. In 1872 the French hair dresser Marcel Grateau patented his "curling iron ", which was made of heavy tongs with rounded internal surfaces, in which one of the arms had a circular convex section and the other a concave one, so that one fitted into the other when the tongs were closed; they were then heated, allowing the hair be waved. This invention was a great success and allowed to develop new hairstyles, as the one with his name, "the Marcel wave".

Near 1880 was in fashion the "pompadour" hairstyle, which consisted in rising the hair upwards in the central part and leaving fallen curls at the sides. One of the variations was the "French pompadour", with the hair held in the top of the head and curls over the forehead.