Stand before a mirror, one eye closed and hair back from your face. Now, trace the reflected contours with a bar of soap.

The Perfect Oval

Like Sophia Loren and Arlene Dahl your face is perfect oval? You can experiment with almost any hairdo: classic, sophisticated, gamine. Your only consideration should be not to distort your perfect proportions. Make the most of them.

The Round Face

Your face is nearly circular with rounded cheeks, full chin and fairly low forehead? You need more length and less width. You can approximate the perfect oval in many ways.

Do:

Add height at the crown. Draw attention to the top of your head with high curls, fluffed bangs, whirling activity, a honey bun, a built-up top over flattened sides. Fluffed bangs, however, must end at the hairline or they will lower forehead unbecomingly. Keep hair full and soft above the ears so the illusion of height is further increased.

You're A Square

Your jaw line is about as wide as your cheeks and your forehead tends toward the square. You must work to add height, soften corners with curves and lengthen your face slightly.

Do:

Draw the eye of the beholder upward to make face seem longer. Wear a diagonal part. Or try a bouffant top swept from a low side part. Look for styles with rounded movement. Break into forehead corners with fringed bangs or waves. Try swirly or divided bangs.

The Rectangular Face

Long, with jaw, cheeks and forehead all about the same width, the rectangular face can be made up to look one of the prettiest of all.

If your face is oblong, strive for styles which either shorten or widen the long lines nature has given you.

Do:

Wear smooth, flat crowns.

Choose a style with some fullness at the sides whether it is outswirling wings, a short upturned page boy, or a puffed-under hairdo. Bouffant styles are flattering to the longer face if the fullness is at the sides, not at the top. Wear bangs if forehead is high. Horizontal lines shorten the face. Divided bangs tend to ovalize your rectangular appearance. Adopt hairdos with lines that get wider as they climb; for example, a full crown with a fan-shaped fringe which sweeps down over one side, thus ovalizing your face.

The Perfect Diamond

A diamond-shaped face is not always a girl's best friend. Your face is a perfect diamond if width is concentrated at the middle and both your forehead and jaw are narrower and approximately the same size.

You have three major problems to concentrate on when looking for your ideal hairdo. You must fill out the brow area, de-emphasize the widest points of your face and soften your chin if it happens to be more pointed than round.

Do:

Keep hair full and wide at top. But not too high. This will tend to broaden your brow and ovalize your wide cheek span. Keep hair at sides soft. Wear over ears and sweep forward. Experiment with lengths to see which is the most becoming. A little longer than ear-length with upturned ends should be flattering if your chin is not pointed.

The Heart-Shaped Face

The inverted triangle, more popularly known as the heart-shaped face, has long been popular with poets. Your face is heart-shaped if it's wide at the forehead and tapered to a pointed, piquant chin.

To attain the illusion of the desirable oval you must balance your face by filling out the chin and taking away width from the forehead.

Do:

Wear fluffy, asymmetric bangs which cover part but not all of your wide brow. Try fullness and width below the ears to broaden the narrow chin line. Break your own heart with angled parts. Try a high part that slants straight toward the center of the crown to break forehead width.

Now you know how to choose the very best hairstyle.