While swimming in a lake of despair and marking time waiting for death, I went searching for images of long haired ladies to keep the inspiration high as my own shortish locks grow out.

I had hair down to my buttocks as a teenager, and on a whim cut it all off. I don’t think I’ve felt quite right since, and now it continues – the terrible, boring and irritating process of growing it out to that length again. To keep myself from chopping it all off in a fit of madness, images of long haired beauties are absolutely essential and it just so happens that a lot of really great ones come from Japan.

While the idea of Geisha can bring about a sense of nostalgic female beauty and mystic, I detest the very idea of women living with the sole function of ‘serving’ men. Pushing my own biases behind, these images are beautiful, rustic and thankfully, historical. My favorites eschew the painted woman ideal entirely, and show a sort of spontaneous, fleshy beauty that popular culture has all but shoved out the window in favor of underfed, photoshopped ugliness. Though I’m quite aware that photography employed it’s own version of air brushing imperfections back in the day.

These images pretty much speak for themselves don’t they? Fantastically long hair in all these photographs and very interesting rustic clothing. Japan before Kera magazine, Ha.

Yes, this is a woman wearing a costume mimicking those dolls that purportedly grow their own hair when possessed by dead people.

The previous two images were from Oshima island, Japenese islands with their own special kimono and hair culture.

For more picture of Meiji era Japan, please check out Okinawa Soba’s flickr stream. You can find all of these images and mountains more, including older European Daguerreotypes and traditional tattoos.