Bow down to the hair bow

Move over scrunchies, there’s a new hair tie in town, writes Mary Ward.

he nostalgic hair bow is back,’’ Tatler magazine proclaimed in November. ‘‘No it isn’t,’’ I politely replied, continuing my life.

But then, although I tried to inhale and exhale as if I had never been exposed to the suggestion that hair bows might be enjoying a moment again, the evidence started mounting.

The Duchess of Cambridge, sporting a J-Crew black velvet hair bow at an event, was Tatler’s first example. As 2018 came to an end, bows were seemingly far and wide, suddenly appearing before me on runways and red carpets.

When Nicole Kidman and Jessica Chastain attended the Golden Globes last month each with a black bow in her hair, I yielded. The hair bow is back.

Hair bows – and their cousins, knotted hair scarves – are one of those items that manage to make you look much more polished than you actually are.

They can hide that you have come to work with your hair in a fluorescent green hair elastic because all 100 of the brown ones you bought (concerningly, not that long ago), have managed to sneak out of your dresser while you were sleeping, and turn a messy bun into a messy bun with a bow, which we all know is not a messy hairstyle at all.

They are pretty without being fussy. They demonstrate thought but not overthought, a little extension activity in your morning routine.

If you’re feeling that you’re a few too many years out of school to tie a bow in your hair, the