Beauty and female body hair traditionally sit together about as well as harsh chemicals on sensitive skin, but thanks to mainstream ideas of beauty becoming more fluid - and hair dyes less toxic - we now have the colourful armpit, a trend that's been growing out of control since late last year.

US hairdresser Roxie Hunt is credited with sparking the movement after she dyed her female colleague's pits blue and blogged about it.

Naturally, a Tumblr followed, along with women posting proud Instagram selfies with the #dyedpits hashtag.

Miley Cyrus recently showed off her hot pink take in a post liked by 396,000 people.

Hunt, 31, details her thoughts on embracing body hair in her Free Your Pits Manifesto, in which she writes: "We aim to normalise the concept of body hair on women and help others embrace their own if they so choose."

"I work in the beauty industry which is as everyone knows an industry that pushes a lot of standards on women," Hunt told Seattle news site KOUW. "But I strongly believe in a woman's right to choose what she does with her own body."

"I'm a huge advocate of empowering women to really think about the choices that they make and make them for the right reasons," Hunt added.

She also charges $65 (£41) for the service in what the New York Times calls her "feminist-leaning salon" Vain, in Seattle.

http://zidisha.tumblr.com/post/118345276187

Embracing armpit hair in the name of feminism is, of course, nothing new, but now Insta-friendly pops of colour are driving the zeitgeist, rather than a sole desire to destigmatize the way women are expected to groom themselves.

However, the majority of entrants in China's much-talked about armpit hair competition last month kept theirs au naturel, while Girls star Jemima Kirke was also sans dye for a red carpet outing last month.

Some headlines did shout about Kirke "flashing" her "bushy armpit hair," but it was a choice that drew a far more muted response than the media fanfare that surrounded Julia Roberts when she wore unshaven underarms with a glitzy dress at the 1999 premiere of Notting Hill.

It could be that Kirke isn't quite as A-list as Roberts and is known for starring in a feminist TV show, but thankfully, 16 years on, there does appear to be a thawing in popular perception of what women should or shouldn't do with their bodies. 

Julia, the world just wasn't ready for you.

Feminism and female body hair have always been uneasy bedfellows. Some women prefer to be ultra-groomed, others don't remove their body hair at all, and there are others who might grow and dye their underarm hair but wouldn't feel comfortable letting their moustaches grow out or be seen with pubic hair poking out of their bikini bottoms.

Ultimately, how people want their bodies to look is nobody's business, but seeing more females shunning razors - whether they dye the resulting hair or not - is one way to normalise the fact that adults of both genders produce armpit hair and that women do have a choice in whether or not to remove it.

Women showing off their #dyedpits:

Fancy an underarm dye job? Here are some DIY tutorials: