1920's Secret Salon

There was a time when purchasing products to make you look beautiful was actually a shameful thing.  Can you believe ladies of status back in the 1920′s tried to preserve the myth of being naturally beautiful and would not be seen purchasing beauty products in public.  Often times a lady would quickly scamper from her carriage and disappear into a discreet entrance of a salon back then.  My…how different things are today.   Beauty products are readily available everywhere we go…and purchasing them is completely acceptable.  Thank goodness!!

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Vivien Leigh portraying Cleopatra (via Corbis)

Did you know the first lipsticks weren’t “sticks” at all…

It is said that the first women to “invent” lip make-up used crushed semi precious jewels and then decorated their lips.  Cleopatra and other Ancient Egyptian royalty had their lipstick made from crushed carmine beetles which gave a deep red pigment.  And to give the paste a shimmering effect, they used something found in fish scales.

Thankfully, we don’t have to crush our own make-up.  By the late 1800′s, Guerlain, a French cosmetic company, began to manufacture lipstick.  Still the idea did not catch on.  It wasn’t until movie stars started wearing it that it became fashionable.  The actors needed the color on their faces so they would stand out in the black & white film.  And so begins the influence of Hollywood on beauty…women everywhere wanted to look like movie stars in their everyday photographs so they started wearing the stuff.  Elizabeth Arden & Estee Lauder began selling it in their salons.  And so it began.

What started out as a product for an elite few has become the primary cosmetic in every girls’ handbag.

Amazing how a great product can spread like wildfire!

We've done it!