Beards and Facial Hair
In the middle of the eighteenth century, European traveller Pehr Kalm tells us, all the "French of Canada, men of quality as well as others" were clean-shaven. This tradition lasted a full century longer, in both Canada and the United States, as confirmed in portraits of the period painted by both local artists and Europeans.

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, most city-dwellers in Canada frequented barbers and wigmakers, perpetuating the European custom. The sophisticated equipment of wigmakers in particular, and the rarity of razors among the general population, confirmed this habit. Those who didn't own razors could rent them, as is reported in certain documents. The coureurs des bois, the voyageurs, and others who lived on the frontier didn't need to shave as often, and could quite easily use any well-sharpened blade.

The fashion for shaving facial hair endured until the middle of the nineteenth century. During this time, the custom of going to the barber and the wigmaker gradually declined, and more and more people shaved themselves at home.

Hair
Before the middle of the nineteenth century, water was not generally used in hair care for men or women. Instead, people resorted to wigs, powders, perfumes, combs and brushes with greater or lesser assiduity.

Hair and Wigs
During the eighteenth century, men "who were elderly and distinguished" wore curled wigs. The younger wore wigs or their own hair, en forme de bourse, which enclosed the pigtail in a black silk bag — both to keep the hair in place and to prevent hair powder from falling onto the shoulders. This style was usually favoured by civil servants and officers, but also artisans. Among the rest of the population, the tendency was to wear the hair long — either loose on the shoulders, or tied up into a ponytail. Only a few wore their hair "short and tightly curled".

Observers of the period tell us that most people took the trouble to look good, and paid particular attention to their hair. Men fastened their hair with the black silk bag, or with a strip of eelskin. Women curled their hair and tied it up with multicoloured ribbons, alternating their own hair with the latest wig fashions from France and England.

Powders and Pomades
Powders, pomades and perfumes of all sorts were generally used with long hair and wigs among both sexes of the upper classes — partly for their scent, but also for their drying ability, since hair that wasn't washed frequently tended to become greasy very quickly.

Although we can't be certain that the bulk of the population had access to all of these same grooming aids, we do know that they frequently used combs, which had become more widely available by the end of the eighteenth century. It also seems that, among those who had combs, the de-licing comb was particularly common, as is suggested in this question posed to a merchant at the beginning of the nineteenth century: "Can you guarantee, Mr. Verreault, that these fine combs that you sell are as good as the ones in the days of the French, when they could remove 50, 60, 80, 100 bugs at a time?"

Among women, in addition to combs and brushes, a wide variety of jewellery has been found in archaeological digs, corroborating the reports of travellers, who underlined the care women of the colony paid to their appearance.

Teeth
Until the first quarter of the nineteenth century — among that small portion of the population who cared about oral hygiene — appearance and the quality of one's breath was more important than the actual health of teeth and gums. As a result, the many oral hygiene products on the market were more concerned with freshening the breath and whitening the teeth than with proper cleaning.

Only a small portion of the upper classes used toothpicks, tooth powders and toothbrushes. The rest of the population rubbed their teeth with a piece of dry fabric wrapped around a finger, and used splinters of sharpened wood as toothpicks — two practices which endured until the twentieth century. Water was not used, as it was still considered very harmful. Certain medicines even suggested that water would make the teeth fall out.

Changes began to occur by the beginning of the twentieth century, as reflected in newspapers of the period. New products and services are advertised, and dentists and "dental technicians" from the United States and Europe announce the opening of offices in Canada's larger towns and cities. Those among the upper classes who believed in dental hygiene thus had access to extraction, fillings, polishing and even to the fitting of new teeth. The majority of the population remained, however, little interested in dental hygiene and — partly due to a lack of financial means — continued to use traditional methods.