#very ramblyyyyy but so it goes with ocs hehe!!

[sneakydraws]

Hair for oc thing?

hair: How does your OC wear their hair? Does it have some kind of meaning?

you didn't specify a character so i'll take this as an opportunity to talk about my peasants ocs because they're the most on my mind rn hehe!!

so among polish peasant women in the past, most common were braids (one or multiple) for unmarried girls, then part of the wedding ceremony was either cutting the bride's hair or putting it up in a new style - either way, the point was that she was no longer supposed to be "showing it off", and from now on she would wear some sort of head covering when in public, most commonly a kerchief. i read in the kraków ethnographical museum that this head covering would have also been worn by "old maids". i believe this cutting of the hair was not a thing for jewish brides? but i haven't looked into it yet. i'm also not sure what the customs were for tatar women, although i have read that, despite this being a muslim community, rules concerning the covering of hair were not as strict as in arab countries?

so anyway, the main character of this story is a young unmarried woman at first and wears her hair in a single braid. it's very straight and smooth, which she herself considers plain and unattractive, but she's definitely the kind of girl who makes sure to brush it a hundred times to ensure it grows well. i've thought about how, because she's actively looking to marry, she would have tried to look her best at all times, even with her limited resources, so i've started giving her a simple but eye-catching ribbon to tie her hair with. after her wedding, she wears the typical kerchief, though i haven't decided yet whether her oczepiny would have involved cutting the hair considerably or just trimming/restyling it. i've also been trying to pin down where the story is set, and i'm not decided yet but this one region's folk dress has a really unique and complicated head dress!

her husband has thick, wavy, slightly unruly black hair because he's a reskin of an existing oc 💀 i've been going through the process of hair regrowing after a buzzcut so i gave him the same kind of length haha, he's a bit lazy and uncaring wrt his appearance so it checks out that he wouldn't cut it frequently. i also figured he should have facial hair but i need to a. research it more and b. get better at drawing it...

the other prominent female character right now is the husband's sister. her hair texture, like her brother's, is more unruly and on the curly side, very thick and healthy (in designing characters who are supposed to be attractive i may slip in my biases haha... i think curly hair is really pretty). i've just thought recently that this could be a source of shame or discomfort for her, because a lot of her character is centred around the pursuit of christian notions of self-restraint and orderliness, so she would rather have the kind of straight, neatly arranged hair that the main character has! alas, just like how her very earthly urges slip out despite her best attempts to be the perfect christian saint, her unruly hair slips out from the kerchief that she decides to wear despite being unmarried. she's not at the age of unmarriageability yet, but she's almost resigned to it, and maybe even a little proud of it in a "oh i already belong to god" sort of way. she has slight marya b vibes haha

there's another female character in the works but she's still wip so the farmhand is my last major character for now! i'm suffering here because i reallllly want to keep this multi-braid hairstyle i gave him on a whim. i was definitely inspired by these designs from a bride's tale

but it's looking less and less likely to be historically accurate for a tatar man in 19th century poland -__-" i'm still grasping at straws looking at various old turkic men's hairstyles and mongolian hairstyles and trying to trace some sort of connection because i really like ittttt but i have a feeling it'll have to be a battle between my historical integrity and my character design sensibilities