Beauty and Cosmetics 1550-1950 by Sarah Jane Downing was published this month by Shire Library. Small and compact, as Shire publications tend to be, this wonderfully illustrated book describes the standards of beauty popular in each era, from 1550 when alabaster brows were highly prized, to the black eyebrows that were favored by 18th century women. As with her best-selling Fashion in the Time of Jane Austen, Ms. Downing provides the reader with a comprehensive overview of the topic. She begins with the Tudor Court and ends with the delightful cosmetic advertisements of the first half of the 20th century.
Marriage à-la-mode: The Countess's Morning Levee, William Hogarth, c. 1745
Because my blog’s theme centers on the Georgian and Regency eras, I will confine much of my recap to those years.
A woman applying beauty patches, Boucher
Mirrors, once only possessed by the rich, became so popular in London in the mid-16th century that British manufacturers petitioned Parliament to ban foreign imports. The ritual of the dressing table became quite elaborate and ladies began to entertain guests as they prepared themselves for the day.
French mop gold boite a mouche patch box with brush, 1730. Images @ Etsy
Decorative patches covered skin blemishes and blotches, sometimes to such an extent that a face could be covered with a variety of dots, half-moon crescents, stars and even a coach and horses! The popularity of using patches began in the mid-17th century and did not wane until the end of the 18th century.
Woman with patches, pale skin and rouged cheeks. Thomas Gainsborough
Porcelain skin was highly prized and created with white lead-based skin cream. Blush was then applied to create a doll-like look. Cosmetics were created in a variety of ways. Here are the ingredients for one recipe for lead face powder that did not come from this book: several thin plates of lead, a big pot of vinegar, a bed of horse manure, water, perfume & tinting agent. Once can only guess how this concoction was put together and at its smell.
Marquise the Pompadour applying face powder with a brush. Boucher, 1758.
Ms. Downing describes in her book:
lead sheets were unrolled and beaten with battledores until all the flakes of white lead came off. These were gathered and ground into a very fine powder… p. 24
Gainsboroughs portrait of Grace Dalrymple Elliot in 1782 shows the craze for dark eyebrows.
For a while during the third quarter of the 18th century, dark eyebrows became all the rage. Lead-based cosmetics, used over time, caused hair-loss at the forehead and over the brows, resulting in a receding hair-line and a bare brow. For those who lost their eyebrows, it became the custom as early as 1703 to trap mice and use their fur for artificial eyebrows. Sadly, the glue did not always adhere well, and a lady could be caught with her brows out of kilter. This hilarious poem was written by Matthew Prior in 1718:
On little things, as sages write,
Depends our human joy or sorrow;
If we don’t catch a mouse to-night,
Alas! no eyebrows for to-morrow. – p.28
Aging beauties staved off the ravages of time with sponge fillers and rouge (sound familiar?), while many women risked poisonous side effects from using their deadly cosmetics. Maria, one of the Gunning sisters who went on to become Lady Coventry, was so addicted to her lead-based paints that she died in 1760 at the age of 27 knowing full well that she was at risk.
Maria, Countess of Coventry
The French Revolution swept away the widespread use of makeup, which was associated with the aristocracy. Defiantly, some aristocratic ladies went to their doom wearing a full complement of make-up: pale skin, patches, rouged cheeks and rosy lips.
The more natural look of the regency woman. Note that the cheeks are still rouged.
Rousseau influenced the concept of nature and a more natural Romantic look took hold, aided by the blockade of cosmetics during the Napoleonic Wars. The death of many soldiers resulted in widespread melancholia and the affectation of a consumptive look. Ladies, nevertheless, were never far from their rouge pot.
Another Regency portrait with subtle makeup. The flower basket adds to the natural look.
As with all Shire books, Sarah Jane Downing’s trip through time provides us with brilliant insights, in this instance it is via cosmetics and how society viewed beauty in each era. By the 1950s, the success of a marriage was defined by how well a woman took care of herself. This included makeup. Beauty, as Ms. Downing wrote, “was switched from a pleasure to an obligation.” Oh, my. I give the delightful Beauty and Cosmetics 1550-1950 four out of five Regency tea cups.
Product Details
Paperback: 64 pages
Publisher: Shire (February 21, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0747808392
ISBN-13: 978-0747808398
Product Dimensions: 5.8 x 0.2 x 8.2 inches
More on the topic:
- An 18th Century Lady’s Toilette: Hours of Leisurely Dressing and Private Affairs
- A French Patch Box, Christie’s
- Makeup: 18th Century Whores and Ladies
- Women’s Hairstyles & Cosmetics of the 18th Century: France & England, 1750-1790
- The Faces Behind the Masks: The Toilette in 18th Century England
- Regency Cosmetics: 1811
Jane Austen's World 
Tous ces portraits de femmes coquettes sont superbes!
J’en connais certains!
Thanks for sharing!
Have a good evening!
Vic,
This is an insightful and beautiful article. The problem of unhealthy cosmetics is still with us. Natural news.com just had an expose about the FDA not regulating toxic metals in cosmetics that are not on the labels. Lead, arsenic and mercury are included in the processing of major well known brands of mascara and other cosmetics as examples stated. It is safer to use health food store brands.
In one of her novels, Louisa May Alcott wrote about ingesting arsenic to improve/whiten one’s complexion and taking belladonna to make the eyes dark and dilated. (Death-defying, but sexy for the time, I guess).
Very interesting. I was thinking today of how in some different days and ages some of my features would have been considered beautiful. Having grown up in a community of people who mainly came from Italian descent and in the 70s when it was cool to look tan like Malibu Barbie, I was the ugly duckling having extremely fair and pale skin. I get lots of compliments on my skin now, but kids made fun of me then. I also have a high forehead which I found out was considered very beautiful and regal during Medieval Times. It was even highly emphasized in art, hairstyles and headpieces I learned in college art history classes. It all is interesting. I used to try to sun myself and did nothing but burn as well as cover my forehead in as many ways as possible, sometimes coming out awkward. One thing I’ve realized over the years is that beauty is inside and not worth risking one’s health and well-being for. It truly shows how much hasn’t changed. What’s in many of our cosmetics now has lead and other toxic materials as mentioned in another comment. Remember those capsules they used to sell with beta carotene that would turn people orange so they could get that tanned look?
I remember in the 2005 Pride and Prejudice that there’s a scene of Mrs. Bennett pinching her cheeks as Darcy and Bingley are approaching the house. I wasn’t sure what else they did back them.
I’m intrigued by the patches in the article. Were they just something to cover up a blemish or something they wanted hidden, or did it also have other purposes, such as we have medicated patches to wear at night over pimples, etc. Also, was it something like some of the fake beauty marks they used to put on. I understand some of those were makeup but some may also have been some sort of sticker or patch.
Thank you for all the work you do in putting together this blog. I really enjoy it. It’s always a highlight when I see a new post listed in my inbox!
In my reading, both of Georgette Heyer and other nonfiction, I’ve been given to understand that patches were in the category of makeup and were used as a beauty aid. That must have been considered culturally appropriates to . Me? I’ve always thought that they were hideous. But each era seems to find its necessary potions and articles to add to their views of beauty.
Mary Ellen, Karen is also correct. Patches were meant to highlight the beauty of a woman’s features. One placed near the mouth moved the viewer’s eyes there, for example. (See the Gainsborough image of the woman wearing only three strategically placed patches, one of which was on her bosom.)
The vogue for patches took on its own life. According to Sarah Jane Dowling, some people wore so many patches that cartoonists had a field day making fun of them. If you purchase the book, you can see how ridiculous some of them looked. Also, patches were a convenient way to hide small pox scars, moles, or other skins blemishes.
It’s crazy to hear about how much lead was used in cosmetics and food back in the day. Everything from lipstick to paprika had lead! But I think cosmetics are still full of bad chemicals. Oh the things we do for beauty!
Oh how exciting! I’ve just ordered this from Amazon. I can’t get enough of this stuff. I even wrote a long research paper in high school entitled “The Painted Face,” in which I argued very melodramatically (and misguidedly) that during the Early Modern Period women’s growing access to cosmetics was directly correlated to their battle for power and autonomy… or something.
It was a very silly paper…
Can’t wait to read this book though, wish I had had it back then :)
I shall be ordering this book. I have loved all the Shire publications I’ve read so far that in anyway connect with the Regency time period. The one on sanitation was really interesting in a nasty kind of way.
I agree with you about Shire Books, Karen. These small volumes provide such depth of information about a particular topic. It’s like owning a fully colored illustrated and lengthy article from a highly regarded history magazine.
I enjoyed reading this article. I am going to buy this book because it brings me back the previous cosmetic eras. I am always curious to learn how people lived, women in particular in various historic periods.
I never had an interest in fashion or beauty in my younger years however, I do now so enjoy these types of articles. I love learning about both. I really want this book also.
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