The French Girl Bob Is Having A Moment. Here's How To Pull One Off
Some hairstyles never go out of style, such as the perennially cool French girl bob. This classic cut is a statement hairstyle that says: "I roll out of bed looking beautiful." That's because this haircut excels at drawing attention to your facial features by accentuating the jawline and cheekbones, while simultaneously obscuring your face with bangs. It gives the wearer the je ne sais quoi quality that's known to French women, by blending the youthful ethos of the bob hair cut with a hint of mystique.
To capture the effortless elegance associated with the French bob, start with the foundation. The French hairstyle is typically rendered by cutting the front half of your hair at the jawline, making it shorter toward the back, and then adding bangs. There are plenty of styling variations to choose from after getting the French bob cut, but the end result stays the same, leaving you with a bouncy and curly head of hair.
Whether you're ready to chop off your locks or are just entertaining the idea, then you've come to the right place. Ahead, we break down the tried and tested ways of achieving and maintaining the French bob.
Curl your hair with or without heat
For a proper French girl cut, we defer to French writer Anne Berest, who in the book of essays "How to Be Parisian Wherever You Are: Love, Style, and Bad Habits," shares that to be French, you should "cut your own hair or ask your sister to do it for you. Of course you know celebrity hairdressers, but only as friends." Needless to say, the style is meant to look effortless (even if you cheat and have your hairstylist create it for you).
One of the ways of achieving the style includes using mini hot tools to frame your face with curls, like Francophile blogger Gabrielle Rojas does in her YouTube video. Rojas shared that she perfects her French bob by blow-drying her hair with a concentrator nozzle, then uses a mini straightener to curl the ends toward her face and then finishes it off with a curling iron, switching the directions of the curls each time.
For a heatless curls option, you can section off towel-dried hair in the evening, twist it into small sections, secure them with a bobby pin, and take them out once your hair is dry the next day. This alternate approach to styling the French bob leaves your hair healthier for longer and will require less styling time in the morning so you can spend more time enjoying your butter croissant and hot coffee.
Less is more
Watch any video of a Parisian getting ready for their day, and you'll be surprised by how minimalistic the French girl look actually is, especially when it comes to hair. "I know that in the U.S. you always have to do a blowout and curl and all that, and my thing is just messy," said an interviewee in Harper Bazaar's short documentary regarding French women's beauty secrets. "This hair, it takes five minutes. The hair should be natural and practical in every way," another woman from the same interview concurs.
It's clear that the elegantly undone style is quintessential to the French girl's enduringly popular beauty aesthetic. Perhaps, while combing over each hairstyling detail, we miss that their devil-may-care attitude is possibly their most potent beauty weapon of all. So, no matter how you style your French girl bob, remember that you look best when you feel your best and that your routine can be as low-maintenance or as meticulously detailed as you see fit.