Moustaches
The handlebar, chevron, pencil, walrus and the curled moustache of Rajasthan. 13 face guides on EveryFaceShape so far.
A moustache is hair on the upper lip, worn alone or with a beard. Styles include the thin pencil, the thick chevron, the drooping walrus, the curled handlebar, the square toothbrush, the horseshoe and the long Fu Manchu. In Rajasthan and Punjab, a full moustache has long been a point of pride, and in many armies it was once part of the uniform.
Styles
The pencil moustache is a narrow line along the lip, the look of 1930s and 1940s film stars. The chevron is thick and wide, following the lip. The walrus droops over the mouth. The handlebar is grown long and its ends waxed and turned up. The horseshoe runs down to the jaw on both sides. Each needs its own trimming and, for curled styles, moustache wax.
Pride and service
British soldiers had to wear a moustache from the 1860s until 1916, and Royal Air Force pilots of the Second World War grew large handlebars; the Handlebar Club was founded in London in 1947. In Rajasthan the curled moonchh is linked in folk tradition with honour, and the Pushkar Fair holds a moustache contest each year. The toothbrush moustache became rare after the Second World War.
Famous moustache face guides
Further reading
Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Fake moustache: ABC Photo, Public domain, source
- Toothbrush moustache: Trailer screenshot, Public domain, source
- Handlebar moustache: unattributed, Public domain, source
- Walrus moustache: Friedrich Hermann Hartmann, Public domain, source
- Horseshoe moustache: Petty Officer 1st Class Kristin Fitzsimmons, USN, Public domain, source
- Pencil moustache: Roland Godefroy, CC BY 2.5, source
- Fu Manchu moustache: Seven Arts Productions. Distributed by Darien House, New York City, Public domain, source