The Pinups of Betsy VanDeusen

This blog is making me realize just how weird and eclectic my interests and skills really are… Today I want to talk about wigs.

I spent some time this evening sewing highlights in to my human hair “wiglet…” I mean, technically, she’s a “3/4 wig,” but isn’t “wiglet” more fun to say? ;-) 

Now, there are a few key benefits to a partial wig (wiglet) like this one: 

1) Like I said in earlier posts, it’s extremely difficult to style your own hair in the back. A wiglet can be easily styled on the block in front of you, and then applied to the back of your head. It’s as easy as putting on a hat!

2) Human Hair wiglets can be “touched up” quickly and easily. Synthetic hair melts when you use a curling iron on it (in other words, you have to use more time consuming methods to touch up synthetic pieces). A human hair wiglet, however, can be applied to your head, and then treated like your own hair. In fact, curling your own hair in with the wiglet hair is the best way to blend the piece in (especially if the color isn’t a dead-on match for your hair).

3) Convincing lace-front wigs are expensive to buy, and labor-intensive to make. With a wiglet, you don’t need to bother with lace-fronts, you can feature your own natural hairline in front- and it really can’t get more convincing than that!

4) Human Hair wigs are very expensive. Wiglets use less hair. So they’re cheaper. End of story.

Now, with all that said, a good lace-front wig is a beauty to behold. A good lace-front wig is made up of millions of tiny knots… Hairs individually tied onto flesh colored netting so fine that it disappears into your skin, and the hairs look like they’re growing out of your head.

I was taught to ventilate (tie hairs onto wig lace) by a man called “Flanders” during my first and only summer-stock theatre job. We were doing “Beauty and the Beast” and we were creating THE BEAST. Phew. Fast forward through 7 years of theatre: an assortment of full and partial lace wigs, fake mustaches, yak-hair beards, and even hairy moles… and that’s where I’m at.  ;-)

The full wig in these pictures is a synthetic-hair wig that I customized, by adding a lace-front to fit my exact hairline. Tonight I brushed her out, and blocked her up all nice-like with twill tape. 

But more on wigs another night… I’ve got some serious sleeping to do! haha

GOODNIGHT!