Part three of our Mod hairstyles guide and we're into the 1970s and beyond. Along with your Mod wardrobe, your choice of hairstyle is part of your style, your image and who you are. The Seventies and into the eighties saw a backlash against the long, non-conformist hairstyles of the sixties and styles when to the other extreme, short, shorter and almost nothing at all.

Paul Weller in his Jam and Square Cut days

1970s - 80s: The Weller Square Cut

Similar to: The Cesar Cut, The French Crop, The Other Steve Marriott Cut

A 70s version of the Cesar Cut or the French Crop, this square cut is as the name suggests, blunt, blockish and full of attitude. Harsher than most French Crop cuts, the style has a very short, mid forehead blunt fringe and squared, helmut style to sides and back. The hair is cut as short as you might expect as short back and sides, but with the added optional longer lengths at the sides and front. The hair is generally cut around the shape of the ear. This style can also be adapted as an Ivy League, Flat Top or crew cut style.

Chas Smash from Madness with a slightly longer than some skinhead cuts.

1970s - 80s: The Skinhead

Similar to: The Buzz Cut, The Flat Top, Suede head

A haircut so extreme that it gave it's name to a mod subculture! The Skinhead is, as you might guess, a cut so short they may have very little or no hair at all (to the desire of the wearer) - hence skinhead.

Skinhead culture started in the late sixties and peaked in the seventies and eighties. As a reaction and rejection to the conservative fifties and peace and love ethos of the sixties, Skinheads went for a much more severe and dramatic look, incorporating mod fashion and Jamaican Rudy Boy culture. Most first wave skinheads wore their hair at a three or two grade length - short, but not bald. Towards the end of the seventies, most skinheads had a grade two or shorter, with an optional side parting shaved in. Into the eighties, most skinheads cut their hair with no guard or shaved it completely with a razor.

Suggs from Madness with a variation of the Flat Top hairstyle

1970s - 80s: The Flat Top

Similar to: The Flat Top, The Ivy League, The Rude Boy

The Flat Top is a short haircut where the hair on the top of the head is usually standing upright and cut to form a flat-appearing deck. This deck may be level, or it may be upward or downward sloping. With it's roots in military fashion, it might be surprising to learn that the Flat Top has been around since at least the early 20th century. A very popular look in the 1950s, it faded out of popularity in the 60s and 70s, but had a mod fashion resurgence in the 1980s and early 90s (possibly as a less severe alternative to the Skinhead look).

The haircut is usually created with electric clippers utilising the clipper over comb technique, though it can also be cut shears over comb or freehand with a clipper. The exact length is dependent on skull shape and the style of flat top.


Further Reading: 

• A Guide to Mens Mod Hairstyles: The Fifties
• The Beatles Style Guide Part 3: 1963 - 1964
• Sixties Boutiques #2: John Stephen - The King of Carnaby Street

The staple of any Retro Sunglasses collection, the Aviator was developed by Bausch & Lomb (the original owners of Ray-Ban) in 1936 and the design patented in 1937.

In the 1920s, new technology in planes meant that pilots were able to fly higher and for longer periods than previously. Some pilots complained that the extended exposure to the sun's glare was giving them headaches and altitude sickness. In 1929, US Army Air Corps Lieutenant General John MacCready asked Bausch & Lomb, who at the time were a New York-based medical equipment manufacturer, to create a pair of sunglasses that would reduce the headaches and nausea experienced by pilots.

The prototype to the Aviator, then called 'anti-glare' sunglasses, was designed in 1936 with plastic frames and green lenses, designed to cut out the glare without impeding vision. The design was updated to its now instantly recognisable thin metal frame the following year and renamed the Ray-Ban Aviator; Aviator after the pilots and the name Ray-Ban chosen to convey that these sunglasses literally banned the rays from the suns from the wearers eyes. The original design featured Ray-Ban's G-15 tempered glass lenses, transmitting 15% of incoming light. The large lenses are slightly convex shaped, to cover the entire range of the human eye and prevent as much light as possible from entering the eye from any angle.

As well as pilots, other groups of people soon found the Aviator useful for purposes. A couple of years after the classic Aviator was developed, Ray-Ban developed a sister style, The Outdoorsman, specifically for activities such as hunting, fishing and shooting.

In the 1940s, gradient lenses and mirror lenses were introduced. These lenses featured a special coating on the upper part of the lens for extra protection, but an uncoated lower lens for a clear view of an aeroplane's controls and instruments.

"People of the Philippines: I have returned" - General MacArthur wades ashore in 1944

During World War II, the Aviator gained more fame in the mainstream after American army General Douglas MacArthur landed on the beaches in the Philippines in 1944. Dramatic newspaper photographs showed him (and other army personnel) wearing Aviator sunglasses, as they waded ashore. "People of the Philippines: I have returned," said General MacArthur in his speech that day.

In the 1950s and 1960s the Aviator grew in popularity moderately. The oversized style, allowing a lot of coverage for the wearer, meant that soon Aviator sunglasses were being adopted by celebrities and politicians.