Vintage Beauty Parlors

About Vintage Beauty Parlors

Remember Saturday trips to the beauty parlor? Test your knowledge of the salons that kept America looking its best! Vintage Beauty Parlors packs 15 multiple-choice questions with a mix of 8 easy, 6 medium, 1 hard questions into a relaxed session of roughly 7 minutes — no sign-up, no timer pressure. An explanation appears after every answer, and finishing once a day keeps your streak alive.

A few sample questions

1. 1. What large, dome-shaped device did women sit under at the beauty parlor to dry their newly set hair?

   Answer: Bonnet hair dryer

   Bonnet hair dryers, large dome-shaped devices that women sat under, were a fixture of every beauty parlor from the 1940s through the 1970s.

2. 2. What method of curling hair involved wrapping sections of wet hair around rods and applying a chemical solution?

   Answer: Permanent wave (perm)

   The permanent wave, or perm, used chemical solutions and curling rods to create long-lasting curls. It was one of the most popular beauty parlor services for decades.

3. 3. What beauty product was used to 'set' hair in place after it was styled with rollers in the 1950s and 1960s?

   Answer: Setting lotion

   Setting lotion was applied to wet hair before wrapping it on rollers. It helped the curls hold their shape once the hair was dried and the rollers were removed.

4. 4. What beauty parlor treatment involved placing the head under a machine that blew hot steam onto the hair?

   Answer: Hair steamer treatment

   Hair steaming was a beauty parlor treatment that used moist heat to open the hair cuticle, allowing deep conditioning treatments to penetrate better.

5. 5. What was the common practice of women sleeping in curlers or pin curls covered by a net to maintain their hairdos?

   Answer: Sleeping in rollers

   Sleeping in rollers was a common nightly ritual for women who wanted to maintain their salon-style hair between beauty parlor visits.

Things you'll learn along the way

• ✓The weekly 'shampoo and set' was a ritual for women in the 1950s and 1960s. Hair was washed, set on rollers, dried under the dryer, and styled.
• ✓Miss Clairol Hair Color Bath, launched in 1956 with the famous 'Does she or doesn't she?' campaign, revolutionized hair coloring by making it easy to do at home.
• ✓Aerosol hair spray became essential in the 1960s for maintaining the era's big, sculpted hairstyles like beehives and bouffants. Aqua Net was the most popular brand.