Croydon facelift

In English slang, a Croydon facelift (sometimes council house facelift, Essex facelift, or in Northern Ireland a Millie Facelift) is a particular hairstyle worn by young women. The hair is pulled back tight and tied in a bun or ponytail at the back. The supposed result is that the skin of the forehead and face are pulled up and back, producing the effects of a facelift. Traction alopecia, a type of gradual hair loss, can result from using this hairstyle.

This hairstyle is frequently worn by certain young women in the United Kingdom, and is portrayed in the media as belonging to young women from the lower social classes, particularly the Chav subculture (Ned in Scotland, Millie in Northern Ireland). The term is thus considered derogatory because it portrays people from Croydon as being lower class. Croydon can be replaced by the name of any other unfashionable residential area.

The Croydon Guardian newspaper joked that the originator of this style may have been the Ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti, based on a Channel 4 documentary.

References

• Brewer's Britain and Ireland, compiled by John Ayto and Ian Crofton, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005, ISBN 0-304-35385-X