On the stone-paved streets of Gion, a quiet district in Kyoto lined with wood-latticed teahouses, photographers captured a striking tableau today: stiff black wigs, pinned with falling orchids; white-painted necks with stripes of skin left exposed. Here, dozens of geiko (Kyoto’s geishas) had gathered in front of a 19th-century theater to celebrate the New Year with traditional dances and rounds of hanafuda, a game played with flower cards—but we were transfixed, above all, by their elaborate hair and makeup. The women sported bright red lips and alabaster skin, drawn on with a painterly hand; dustings of sakura-pink shadow around the eyes; and jeweled ornaments struck into those architectural black buns. The effect was proof of the power beauty has to transport us through time—and halfway around the world.
The post The Exquisite Beauty of Japan’s New Year’s Geishas appeared first on Vogue.
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