The allure of a beautiful face didn't just materialize yesterday. Painted ladies, and even gents, have been known through centuries of artwork and illustrations.
Even the paintings of ancient Egypt depict faces with elaborately drawn eyeliner. And speaking of Cleopatra's time, she evidently enjoyed a few milk and honey treatments to keep her skin as smooth as silk, according to About Beauty Guide Shirley Bragg. She also mentions a time when beauty endeavors were annoying, if not downright deadly.
"During the time of Louis XIV and Queen Elizabeth I, we took a few chances to look our best with catastrophic results," Bragg notes on her website.
In an effort to have extremely light colored hair, to match the pale complexion favored during this period, these folks actually used lye to bleach their locks. As you can imagine, the harsh product caused quite a bit of hair loss that led to the wearing of elaborate white wigs.
And if wearing huge wigs wasn't bad enough, the lard used to hold them in place attracted lice and other pests. The scenario gets worse, however.
All those lovely whiter shade of pale complexions came with a price. It seems that these folks didn't realize the danger of lead poisoning and used the substance as a whitening cosmetic. This mistake, unfortunately, led to many premature deaths.
"It was not a pleasant time for beauty," Bragg adds in her Beauty Through the Ages article.
There was even a time in history, primarily through the Victorian age and even a bit earlier, where make-up use was likened to playing in the devil's workshop. When these types of restrictions come to mind, they bring about thoughts of Scarlett O'Hara pinching her cheeks for a bit of color in "Gone with the Wind."
In fact, women of questionable morals were associated with excessive lipstick and rouge use right up until the World War II era. But as ladies began to earn their own money, more and more focused on purchasing beauty products, according to Bragg.
Thinking in these terms makes sense. Even though lipstick hit the market in 1915 and Helena Rubenstein outfitted a few silent movie stars in flamboyant make-up in the late teens, from a collecting standpoint, there aren't many cosmetic items available dating earlier than the 1920s. And the items that you find from the '20s and '30s are usually of an art deco nature and bring about the flamboyant flapper image, not a representation of the "average" woman.
In addition to loose powder compacts, which most women owned up until the end of the 1950s when disposable pressed powder was introduced, other types of beauty products can also be deemed collectible.
An extension of the compact, the carryall continues to be popular with collectors of accessory and cosmetic items. The earliest models, usually dating to the '20s and '30s, often had chains attached like miniature purses.
In addition to holding powder, a carryall also had spots for rouge and lipstick. Some included coin holders, a hair comb and a tiny bottle for perfume. Later models, made primarily during the '40s and '50s, even had a separate compartment for cigarettes.
There were also fitted handbags available that held numerous cosmetic items, usually in glass bottles. These seem to be the forerunner of the train case or overnight bag. These bags held spots for body lotion, skin cream and cosmetics such as small rouge compacts and tubes of lipstick in metal cases. These containers can be considered collectible with or without the case they came in.
Even individual lipsticks have a following now days, especially if they're in ornate containers. Although they're not extremely expensive, usually found for $15 or less, those with rhinestone decorations and elaborate shapes might bring even more.
Other individual cosmetic items, such as face powder boxes, nail care items and cake mascara, make a home on the vintage vanity table. Some people seek out product lines that no longer exist, while others prefer familiar names that reflect different packaging as the years passed.
Many people would love to find a paper powder box with an illustration done by Salvador Dali these days. Better check the back of your bathroom cabinet to make sure you're not unknowingly harboring an expensive collector's item. You might even find a powder box featuring the faces of several Petty girls. Those pin-up queens are probably more popular now than when they hit calendars back in the '40s.
Knowing that cosmetics of the past have now become desirable, should you save all your empty eye-shadow cases and plastic mascara tubes for future generations? Probably not. If they're really special, such as designer inspired or elaborately packaged items, then it might be worth tucking a few away. But it's pretty safe to say most of the average drugstore cosmetics won't be worth a lot 50 years from now simply because they're so common.
Cara Nome cosmetic and beauty product photo by Pamela Wiggins
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