Oh, how I want a bristling, brigadier-ish moustache of my very own. You see, the ’tache is rumoured to have one useful function: stroking one stimulates the intellect. And trying to explain the sudden popularity of the moustache is a knotty problem. Just look at the 12 men on these pages.

It is a diverse portfolio, moustache-wise. Some stand stiff, proud and assiduously waxed. Others tumble across the upper lip unkempt, low-hanging and daringly asymmetrical. Some simply defy description.

Moustaches aside, the most shocking aspect of these pictures is that photographer Alan Powdrill was not forced to hunt high and low to find his subjects. He simply frequented the hippest bars and pubs of East London and found himself practically tripping over them. “Walk around in Brick Lane and Shoreditch,” says Powdrill, “and you’ll see loads of painfully cool people who look great – with moustaches. They used to be considered naff, didn’t they?”

Used to? Naff? Alan, please: the days when moustaches were mainstream, when “kissing a man without a moustache is like eating an egg without salt” was an un-ironic statement, are long gone. The moustache is such a passé affectation that, in Britain at any rate, it was, until recently, threatened with extinction. In the US, the ’tache is so anachronistic – and so comical – that “fingerstaches” (’taches drawn on the index finger and held above the lip) are a bona fide trend (see fingerstache.ning.com).

So why this sudden sprouting? The beginnings of an answer can be found in the moustaches themselves. You can divide them into two categories. There are the curled numbers that would go well with tweed and a penny-farthing: turn-of-the-century ’taches. Most of the rest hail from a more recent era: the Eighties. “When I was growing up,” says 42-year-old Powdrill, “Tom Selleck in Magnum was the naffest thing ever. But now, if you put him in Brick Lane, he’d fit in perfectly.” So Eighties ’taches are part of a broader revival.

The penny-farthings, meanwhile, are symptomatic of a more perplexing East London vogue, a self-conscious (achingly so) return to the affectations of the Edwardian gent. Spearheaded by artist Billy Childish and a magazine called The Chap, this is a new breed of old fogeys. With fogeyish moustaches.

These two trends have intermingled to spawn this bastard rash of ’taches. So far, though, it hasn’t extended much beyond Brick Lane. Except in November, when the men’s health initiative Movember (uk.movember.com) encourages men to grow moustaches in aid of the Prostate Cancer Charity. It is very popular: last year, more than 173,000 took part, raising £14 million. The genius of Movember is that it allows moustache-curious men who don’t live in tolerant zones such as Brick Lane to grow a ’tache with relative impunity – because it’s for charity.

In this post-feminist, postmodern world, anything a man can do, a woman can, too. Except, that is, grow a big, curly, food-flecked moustache. Back off, sisters – you can’t have our ’taches, too. Which, I fear, explains this renaissance. The moustache is a way for men to beat their chests and bellow a declaration of masculinity. Pathetic, really, but at least it’s an explanation. So right now, if I did have a moustache, I’d be twirling it in triumph like some raffish musketeer. And upstairs, my girlfriend would be packing her bags.

Noel Leeman, 27, web designer

“The notion of the old English gent has become a bit lost these days, and my moustache is a nod to them. I feel that having it prompts me to be more chivalrous. However, I get, ‘Is it real?’ a lot, which is tiresome, and people asking if they can take my picture.”

Rakan Budeiri, 24, shop worker

“I like to experiment with my appearance and see how people react, so 18 months ago I grew my moustache because I thought it would be funny. Inspired by my Middle Eastern ancestry, I styled it on Salvador Dalí’s. Now people don’t stop commenting.”