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  • Hair trends.

  • As quickly as they appear, they disappear.

  • Except for this one.

  • Men's powdered wigs, a trend that strangely lasted

  • a century and had close ties not to fashion

  • but to an STD.

  • Powdered wigs, also known as perukes,

  • were all the rage in the 1700s.

  • They were the hot item for aristocratic men.

  • But it wasn't a stylistic choice.

  • Rather men mostly wore the wigs

  • because of syphilis.

  • Starting in 1580, syphilis outbreaks

  • spread to become one of the worst epidemics

  • to ever hit Europe, on par with The Black Death.

  • There were no antibiotics to combat the disease, and

  • so victims faced blindness, dementia,

  • hair loss and even open sores.

  • At that time going bald was considered

  • quite embarrassing.

  • As syphilis spread, the wig makers got busy.

  • They created beautiful perukes coated with powder

  • and even scented with lavender to hide

  • any unpleasant smells.

  • At this point the wigs were not yet considered stylish

  • but all that changed in 1655 when Louis XIV

  • started going bald.

  • Clearly the King of France couldn't be seen

  • without hair.

  • So he did what any man of that day would,

  • he bought a wig.

  • Well actually he hired 48 of the best wig makers

  • to create him a custom wig.

  • Five years later, the King of England did

  • the same thing.

  • Shortly thereafter aristocrats followed suit

  • and thus the term "bigwig" was born.

Hair trends.

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