The Mohawk Becomes, Well, Cute Joe Fornabaio for The New York Times.Four versions of the new mainstream Mohawk, are worn, from left, by Jean-Paul Folch, James Brehm, Kevin Teague and Craig Lockner.
E-Mail This Printer-Friendly Single-Page Reprints By ERIC WILSON Published: September 1, 2005 A YEAR ago Alex Kamnitsis, 27, an executive assistant at a film production company in Manhattan, adopted a hair style he calls a modern version of the Mohawk. He was looking to make a statement: despite his corporate trappings he is a person with a little edge. This summer, when he asked his stylist at the Oscar Bond salon in SoHo for the same cut, closely buzzed along the sides and a strip of long hair on top, Mr. Kamnitsis discovered that the Mohawk, like so many other badges of anarchy, had gone mainstream.
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Ian West/PA, via Associated Press
Maddox Jolie, 4, has been a haircut inspiration to all ages. "When I was getting my hair cut, there was a woman next to me with her son, a little kid, who was asking for a Mohawk," Mr. Kamnitsis said.
Perhaps it was the wave of stylish men in New York and Los Angeles in the late 1990's who gelled their hair into luminous crests known as fauxhawks who paved the way for more extreme versions as a popular summer look. Or perhaps the Mohawk has re-entered the vocabulary of stylists who operate far from the barbershops near St. Marks Place, the city's historic thoroughfare for alternative style, thanks to the well-documented and ever-evolving Mohawk of one man, Maddox Jolie, 4.
Maddox, the adopted son of Angelina Jolie, is a regular face in the pages of Star and Us Weekly, and in the way of so many trends born in the pages of celebrity magazines, he has done for Mohawks what Harry Potter did for round spectacles. He made them trendy, starting a cut-to-the-scalp movement among Hollywood offspring that now includes the children of Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany: their sons Kai, 8, and Stellan, 1. Et tu, Natalie Portman?
Yet, the latest Mohawks, a trend that rears its ugly-beautiful head in a new shape every few years, are of the sort that Travis Bickle, had he spotted them from his cab, would have refused as fares. They are often wider and flatter than the Mohawks of the 1970's London punk scene and are worn naturally, without a glutenous product.
Some are curly and extend down the back into mullets or are gently buzzed along the sides. The result is a hybrid of looks, including the mulladour - half mullet, half pompadour - or as in the case of Maddox Jolie, the hawkapoo, referring to the popularity and cutesiness of certain curly mixed-breed poodles.
"Like a lot of things in beauty, what was considered ugly last week is probably going to be beautiful next week," said Howard McLaren, the creative vice president of the Bumble & Bumble salon in New York. Mr. McLaren is an advocate of the modern Mohawk, which is also making a comeback on skateboarders in Santa Monica, Calif., and among hipsters in Hoxton, London's answer to the meatpacking district in Manhattan.
"Everyone should have one at some point in their life," Mr. McLaren said. "The first really cool one I saw was about five years ago in Paris when the designer Jeremy Scott shaved one side of his head and wore his hair off to the side. It was floppy and not all gelled up, trying to be some kind of fin."
Mr. McLaren, who grew up in Scotland, is a scholar of Mohawks, having witnessed adaptations by veggie punks in the 1980's, with the requisites of a traditional Mohawk sans aggressive posturing; and the more brilliantly hued and plasticized styles of the punk and new wave eras. What strikes him as distinctive about the latest incarnations is their lack of the warrior connotation that defined the Mohawk through history.
"I find them quite sexy on women," he said. "We did a few earlier this year that had the look of the fauxhawk, but they were a bit more aggressive than that, with big fluffy bits you could tie up and with lighter colors as well. It gives them a softness that makes them look cool."
One example of that look would be Wykerria Campbell, 19, of Newark, who works for E-ZPass and drew stares as she walked across Christopher Street in Greenwich Village last week. Her self-constructed Mohawk sprouted from the center of her head like an exotic cactus. Ms. Campbell secured it with a drawstring and a heavy application of hair spray, then buzzed the sides to a close shave.
"I like it because it's different," she said. "If you have real hair, you can make this look in 15 minutes."
Jean-Paul Folch, 29, a computer programmer, decided two months ago on a more gradual trim than the full shave of a complete Mohawk. He described the approach as "a little crazy, but not too crazy."
I've seen a few people doing variations of the Mohawk, so I wanted to do my own thing," Mr. Folch said, adding that he was not aware of the Mohawk trend among Hollywood toddlers. "I saw that shortly after I got my hair cut," he said. "I think Maddox looks really cute, but whatever."
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Forum: Fashion and Style Other Mohawk converts argue that the look speaks more about individuality than a trend. Kevin Teague, 28, an architect at Studio Daniel Libeskind, said he liked the style, which he has worn on and off over the last year, because it is "relatively flexible." It gives him the option to wear it up, for a more dramatic appearance, or down, for situations that require a more conservative appearance. "In my industry it almost gives me more credibility that I have a haircut that is seemingly designed as an indication of what comes out of my hand as well," Mr. Teague said.
The look is catching on in diverse circles. Craig Lockner, 27, who works on editorial bookings for Ford Models, was considered among the more strait-laced and serious employees at the agency, which has a relaxed environment, so in August he slipped out to a barbershop on East Sixth Street and returned with a two-and-a-half-inch-wide Mohawk.
"Now everybody's throwing in ideas of what should be my next style," he said.
James Brehm, 17, wanted a new look, too. He now sports a modified Mohawk at the ice-cream parlor where he works in Montclair, N.J. The Mohawk lets Mr. Brehm and Mr. Lockner escape the image they imagined other people had of them.
"I'm not too good at communicating with people," Mr. Brehm said. "I like people communicating with me. People look at me and say: 'I want to talk to that guy. He looks pretty cool.' I like the attention my hair gets."
Not surprisingly, Mohawk purists are disturbed by the trend. Blaise Garber, 22, a Columbia student with a bushy and bleached Mohawk (and multiple body piercings), has worn the look for five years but is considering a change.
"It doesn't have the same teeth as it used to," he said. "Everything begins on the outside, and eventually America brings it to the center. It's hard to take."
Mohawks were once a signifier of aggression, a visually intimidating extension of the human backbone, or so Celtic warriors believed. They yanked out the hair along the sides of their heads to appear scary to the Romans, who thought they were barbaric. The Mohawk owes its very name to a hardy American Indian tribe who plucked their hair into a strip in times of war. But the battle is over.
Thanks to their youngest adopters, Mohawks are now merely adorable.
thats that dude DJ AM right? ive never heard dude..just know of him since he dates that dumb broad, but I am curious to what kind of music dude plays? Is he anygood-skillwise? tastewise?
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Joe Fornabaio for The New York Times.Four versions of the new mainstream Mohawk, are worn, from left, by Jean-Paul Folch, James Brehm, Kevin Teague and Craig Lockner.
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By ERIC WILSON
Published: September 1, 2005
A YEAR ago Alex Kamnitsis, 27, an executive assistant at a film production company in Manhattan, adopted a hair style he calls a modern version of the Mohawk. He was looking to make a statement: despite his corporate trappings he is a person with a little edge. This summer, when he asked his stylist at the Oscar Bond salon in SoHo for the same cut, closely buzzed along the sides and a strip of long hair on top, Mr. Kamnitsis discovered that the Mohawk, like so many other badges of anarchy, had gone mainstream.
Skip to next paragraph
Forum: Fashion and Style
Maddox Jolie, 4, has been a haircut inspiration to all ages.
"When I was getting my hair cut, there was a woman next to me with her son, a little kid, who was asking for a Mohawk," Mr. Kamnitsis said.
Perhaps it was the wave of stylish men in New York and Los Angeles in the late 1990's who gelled their hair into luminous crests known as fauxhawks who paved the way for more extreme versions as a popular summer look. Or perhaps the Mohawk has re-entered the vocabulary of stylists who operate far from the barbershops near St. Marks Place, the city's historic thoroughfare for alternative style, thanks to the well-documented and ever-evolving Mohawk of one man, Maddox Jolie, 4.
Maddox, the adopted son of Angelina Jolie, is a regular face in the pages of Star and Us Weekly, and in the way of so many trends born in the pages of celebrity magazines, he has done for Mohawks what Harry Potter did for round spectacles. He made them trendy, starting a cut-to-the-scalp movement among Hollywood offspring that now includes the children of Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany: their sons Kai, 8, and Stellan, 1. Et tu, Natalie Portman?
Yet, the latest Mohawks, a trend that rears its ugly-beautiful head in a new shape every few years, are of the sort that Travis Bickle, had he spotted them from his cab, would have refused as fares. They are often wider and flatter than the Mohawks of the 1970's London punk scene and are worn naturally, without a glutenous product.
Some are curly and extend down the back into mullets or are gently buzzed along the sides. The result is a hybrid of looks, including the mulladour - half mullet, half pompadour - or as in the case of Maddox Jolie, the hawkapoo, referring to the popularity and cutesiness of certain curly mixed-breed poodles.
"Like a lot of things in beauty, what was considered ugly last week is probably going to be beautiful next week," said Howard McLaren, the creative vice president of the Bumble & Bumble salon in New York. Mr. McLaren is an advocate of the modern Mohawk, which is also making a comeback on skateboarders in Santa Monica, Calif., and among hipsters in Hoxton, London's answer to the meatpacking district in Manhattan.
"Everyone should have one at some point in their life," Mr. McLaren said. "The first really cool one I saw was about five years ago in Paris when the designer Jeremy Scott shaved one side of his head and wore his hair off to the side. It was floppy and not all gelled up, trying to be some kind of fin."
Mr. McLaren, who grew up in Scotland, is a scholar of Mohawks, having witnessed adaptations by veggie punks in the 1980's, with the requisites of a traditional Mohawk sans aggressive posturing; and the more brilliantly hued and plasticized styles of the punk and new wave eras. What strikes him as distinctive about the latest incarnations is their lack of the warrior connotation that defined the Mohawk through history.
"I find them quite sexy on women," he said. "We did a few earlier this year that had the look of the fauxhawk, but they were a bit more aggressive than that, with big fluffy bits you could tie up and with lighter colors as well. It gives them a softness that makes them look cool."
One example of that look would be Wykerria Campbell, 19, of Newark, who works for E-ZPass and drew stares as she walked across Christopher Street in Greenwich Village last week. Her self-constructed Mohawk sprouted from the center of her head like an exotic cactus. Ms. Campbell secured it with a drawstring and a heavy application of hair spray, then buzzed the sides to a close shave.
"I like it because it's different," she said. "If you have real hair, you can make this look in 15 minutes."
Jean-Paul Folch, 29, a computer programmer, decided two months ago on a more gradual trim than the full shave of a complete Mohawk. He described the approach as "a little crazy, but not too crazy."
I've seen a few people doing variations of the Mohawk, so I wanted to do my own thing," Mr. Folch said, adding that he was not aware of the Mohawk trend among Hollywood toddlers. "I saw that shortly after I got my hair cut," he said. "I think Maddox looks really cute, but whatever."
Skip to next paragraph
Forum: Fashion and Style
Other Mohawk converts argue that the look speaks more about individuality than a trend. Kevin Teague, 28, an architect at Studio Daniel Libeskind, said he liked the style, which he has worn on and off over the last year, because it is "relatively flexible." It gives him the option to wear it up, for a more dramatic appearance, or down, for situations that require a more conservative appearance. "In my industry it almost gives me more credibility that I have a haircut that is seemingly designed as an indication of what comes out of my hand as well," Mr. Teague said.
The look is catching on in diverse circles. Craig Lockner, 27, who works on editorial bookings for Ford Models, was considered among the more strait-laced and serious employees at the agency, which has a relaxed environment, so in August he slipped out to a barbershop on East Sixth Street and returned with a two-and-a-half-inch-wide Mohawk.
"Now everybody's throwing in ideas of what should be my next style," he said.
James Brehm, 17, wanted a new look, too. He now sports a modified Mohawk at the ice-cream parlor where he works in Montclair, N.J. The Mohawk lets Mr. Brehm and Mr. Lockner escape the image they imagined other people had of them.
"I'm not too good at communicating with people," Mr. Brehm said. "I like people communicating with me. People look at me and say: 'I want to talk to that guy. He looks pretty cool.' I like the attention my hair gets."
Not surprisingly, Mohawk purists are disturbed by the trend. Blaise Garber, 22, a Columbia student with a bushy and bleached Mohawk (and multiple body piercings), has worn the look for five years but is considering a change.
"It doesn't have the same teeth as it used to," he said. "Everything begins on the outside, and eventually America brings it to the center. It's hard to take."
Mohawks were once a signifier of aggression, a visually intimidating extension of the human backbone, or so Celtic warriors believed. They yanked out the hair along the sides of their heads to appear scary to the Romans, who thought they were barbaric. The Mohawk owes its very name to a hardy American Indian tribe who plucked their hair into a strip in times of war. But the battle is over.
Thanks to their youngest adopters, Mohawks are now merely adorable.
I'm just waitin' on the return of the Liberty Spikes (cue Bam's back-in-the-day jpeg assault).
After a full day of
street hustle
thug rumble
fist pumping
punk action
my.spikes.collapse.
Cue Everyone: I trusted my money with THIS dude?
aks morsecode.