Fashion Masochist: The Silver Fox

After a milestone birthday, J. Sybylla Smith finds a gray future isn’t so bleak.

By J. Sybylla Smith

Color Commentary
Tips from Boston’s top stylists on how to gray gracefully.

1. Merge “Start by getting highlights that blend the gray with the current color, avoiding contrast. Then wean off the highlighting as the gray comes in.” —Jeremy Dellaria, Salon Marc Harris

2. Distract “During the growing-out process, switch the focus from your roots to some really hot accessories, like new glasses or fabulous earrings.” —Seth Sellman, James Joseph Salon

3. Sculpt “Get the funkiest haircut you can. You’ll look fashion conscious instead of looking like you’re just letting yourself go.” —Michael Albor, the Loft

4. Maintain “Trim it, trim it, trim it. Every month.” - Jeffrey Lyle, Emerge

In her new book, Going Gray, writer Anne Kreamer chronicles her decision, at age 49, to stop coloring her hair. She reports that among other benefits, she got more “winks” on Match.com as a silver fox than she did as a brunette. Myself, I haven’t been consistently called a fox since my senior year of college, some three decades ago, when my friend Tom went on a campaign to woo me (“Hellooo, Fox,” he’d call across the quad). Then, last August, I turned 50. And although my red hair doesn’t show signs of changing yet, Kreamer’s book got me wondering: Is gray the new way to go?

The Experience Patricia Wrixon at the Salon at 10 Newbury rigs me with a striking wig made of human and artificial hair, and a coworker styles it to resemble my own layered cut. I catch two other clients eyeing my silver bob.

“Should I stay gray?” I ask. “Oh, yes,” they say. An hour later, climbing into my car to collect the kids at school, I inspire a double take from a Clooney look-alike. What a hoot!

The response in the carpool line is positive, if at times a tad backhanded. One dad says, “You are going to be a beautiful old lady.” An admiring mom exclaims, “I think you look funky!” My kids, however, disagree. “You look old,” says Eliza, age nine. And while I get an almost unanimous thumbs-up from my son Simon’s sixth-grade engineering club, the lone dissenter is, of course, Simon himself.

Later, dressing for a friend’s 50th birthday party, I reach for my most sophisticated separates and heels to suit the now mature-looking woman I’ve become. At the party, I’m lavished with praise: One person comments that the gray complements my green eyes; another deems me “so, so chic.” Talk turns to gray, as several women lament the time and money they’ve dedicated to staving off aging. Most—especially the single girls in the room—are hesitant to stop coloring, but I sense a glimmer of reconsideration in the prolonged glances of a few.

The Verdict Because I haven’t had to worry about covering up my roots, I’ve been able to deny the aging process a bit (my brother describes me as his “avant-garde sister who thinks she’s still in high school”). Yet by forcing me to embrace my age and honor my experience as a 50-year-old mother of two, my week in gray was empowering. The trick to aging gracefully, I learn, is to actually let aging happen. Hey, Tom—call me!

Originally published in Boston magazine, January 2008