Hair everywhere, don’t care
To shave or not to shave. Actually, that is not even the question. The question is: can we celebrate female body hair, wherever it is or isn’t?
Let’s skip the fuzz and go straight to the ‘hair-raising’ facts: the average human body boasts some 5 million hair follicles, and most of them are there for a very good reason. Pubic hair, for example, has been getting a bad rep for being ‘unhygienic’ while the opposite is true! Your bush actually prevents bacteria from entering your vagina and provides a cushion against harmful friction. It also helps spread pheromones; the chemicals that make us irresistible to our partners. In other words, you shave down there, you may miss out on a lot of great sex.
Body hair has been censured and policed for centuries, with Roman poet Ovid setting the tone in 2 B.C. by urging women to groom so “that no rude goat find his way beneath your arms and that your legs be not rough with bristling hair.” From Botticelli‘s smooth Venus – no wonder she had a razor named after her! – to the bald pubes of Renoir’s bathing beauties, one thing becomes clear when you check Western Culture’s iconic art: our feminine beauty standard is smooth and hairless.
Growing up, I found that concept baffling: some hair – the hair on our heads, for example – is acceptable, and some of it is not? Says who? As the women around me shaved, plucked and waxed, I proudly watched my hair grow and give ‘character’ to my body. Sure, I had a feminist motivation: if guys don’t shave, why should I? But mostly, I just loved the look, from Friday Kahlo’s eyebrows to my beautiful, natural armpits. The times that I did shave everything off, I felt like a Barbie doll, robbed off my expression. A few years later, when Carrie Bradshaw unwittingly got a Brazilian on ‘Sex and the City’, I could really relate to her reaction: “I got mugged! She took everything I got!”
In the past 20 years, there have been some brave women publicly breaking hair taboos. Remember the world gasping at Julia Robert‘s hairy pits during the Notting Hill premiere in 1999 or Lady Gaga performing in 2011 with dyed green armpit hair? But it was the rise of social media that really gave momentum to the body-hair revolution. A 2018 Instagram post by Rihanna flaunting her leg hair received 3.8 million likes and comments such as ‘If Rihanna can have leg hair, bitch so can I!’ And when Madonna unapologetically showed off her armpit hair using the caption ‘Long hair… don’t care!’, celebrities like Miley Cyrus, Lena Dunham and Gigi Hadid followed suit. Viral hashtags like #bodyhairdontcare and #myhairmychoice cemented the deal: the body-hair positivity movement was here to stay.
Letting our body hair grow can be a feminist statement, like women burning their bras during the 1960s. Yet there is one big difference: fourth-wave feminism is about the freedom to choose and define yourself for yourself. You can shave, but you don’t have to. Do you like some parts of your body hairy? Cool! You don’t? Also cool! You do you. To me, body hair is natural; not liking body hair is cultural. Let’s shake off cultural conditioning and stop feeling ashamed. Who knows, as a result, we might even stop shaming other women for their hair choices, whether they are plucking, waxing, lasering, keeping their hair natural or dying it neon pink. Women sticking together; how’s that for a bad-ass feminist statement?
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Building bridges
From the Erasmus Bridge and the Mercedes-Benz Museum to Qatar’s metro network; Ben van Berkel’s iconic landmarks bring people together in rapturous beauty, again and again. I talked with the Dutch architect and educator about sensuality, ‘healthy’ buildings and the remarkable parallels between our designs.
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More than a feeling
Don’t ignore your emotions; they are much more powerful than you can imagine. By linking the magical world of emotions with hard science, Dutch scientist Pierre Capel, professor emeritus in experimental immunology, shows us the consequences of our feelings and the power of our minds. The message: we can do much more than we think. “Meditate. It’s the single best thing you can do for your health.”
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Marlies Says
Keto curious?
The fact that I feel bikini-confident all year round is, of course, a nice bonus. But for me, the biggest payoff of following the keto diet is the way it optimizes my health and gives me tons of energy.
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Marlies Says
Super (skin) food
‘If you can’t eat it, why put it on your skin?’. I pretty much live by this beauty adage. After all, with your skin being one of your body’s largest organs, anything – and I mean anything! – you put onto your skin will end up in your bloodstream.
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marlies|dekkers lingerie
Marlies|dekkers heeft een grote variëteit aan lingerie wat gedragen kan worden door iedereen en voldoet aan iedere vrouw haar behoefte. Naast het aanbieden van producten op onze webshop, houden we een blog bij in de categorie ‘Maison Marlies’ waar over verschillende onderwerpen geschreven wordt zoals; Waarom 50 worden fantastisch is, een 5-stappenplan voor het kopen van lingerie voor jouw vriendin, vrouw of partner , hoe je lingerie als deel van je outfit maakt en andere leuke onderwerpen.
Maison Marlies
In Maison Marlies blog kun je van alles lezen over het leven achter en rondom het bedrijf. Of je nu wilt weten waar ze haar inspiratie vandaan haalt voor het ontwerpen van een nieuwe collectie, of dat je interesse hebt in haar levensstijl, gezonde recepten, of haar smaak in bijzondere kunst, je kunt het vinden in de blog. Deze zakenvrouw krijgt het voor elkaar om met een knipoog te schrijven over haar zakenreizen, shop avonturen, haar collega’s, vrienden en familie en zelfs over haar vakanties waar ze even helemaal tot rust komt. Wanneer je even niet meer weet hoe je jou goede bh maat kunt vinden, biedt Maison Marlies een aantal richtlijnen zodat je je boezem kunt schudden zonder dat je borsten eruit floepen. Comfort voor je buste is een combinatie van de juiste maat en de juiste kwaliteit. Je wilt toch geen onhandig ondergoed, terwijl dit eigenlijk heel makkelijk voorkomen kan worden door het dragen van hoge kwaliteit lingerie?! En wanneer je voorgevel goed op z’n plaats gehouden wordt kun je eindelijk volledig je vrouwelijkheid vieren. De blog geeft advies over het mixen en matchen van lingerie, over het stimuleren en inspireren van je eigen stijlgevoel en houdt je op de hoogte van de laatste trends.
blij met marlies|dekkers lingerie
Haar celebrity vrienden zijn ook erg blij met de perfecte pasvorm van de bh's van marlies|dekkers. Deze vriendinnen laten met trots hun sexy lingerie van marlies|dekkers zien in fotoshoots voor tijdschriften, en tijdens optredens, tv-shows of zelfs in films. Maison Marlies wijdt een speciaal gedeelte van de blog aan gerelateerde nieuwtjes en ontwikkelingen zodat je altijd op de hoogte blijft van de laatste ontwikkelingen rondom de speciale missie die de visie van Marlies’ ademt voor de toekomst.
