Natural History Museum Hair!

Posted in: Drivel

Spent a very enjoyable Tuesday afternoon with Mo checking out the Fabulous Beasts and Hair exhibitions at the Natural History Museum.

The "beasts" exhibit has a mix of oil paintings and huge electron microscope blow-ups of insects, from ladybirds to praying mantises. The microscope photos I found enthralling; delicately leaning over the "don't touch" barrier and squinting at the photo from mere inches didn't seem to exhaust the detail captured on the enormous inkjet prints. (I guess since my file's declassified it's no secret anymore my eyesight has been cybernetically augmented by a prosthetic chip implant with an active optic nerve amp and intraocular muscle regulator).

It's a shame the same can't be said of my taste in hairstyle. The L'Oréal-sponsored Hair exhibit featured videos, samples, games, even a virtual salon. There is a section on how hair products are designed with all the remarkably sophisticated (and amusing-looking) machinery used to thrash-test everything from strength improvement to quantifying how long a spray helps hair keep its hold. A product ad will never seem the same.

One of several things I was surprised by is that permanent hair dye actually chemically alters the entire hair, the dye really permeates and reacts all the way through. Oh, and some of the fantasy hair designs are outstanding.

Virtual Hair Salon: (you can do this yourself!)

Posted by Paul Makepeace at August 24, 2004 21:00 | TrackBack