Not only were individual women no longer distinguishable by rank, but their new faces were false and ugly. Driven by a desire to create a self-evident hierarchy of merit, they criticized cosmetics for sustaining aristocratic debauchery and fashions that promoted deceit by women of all social groups. ![]() 6 Cosmetics were still under attack, but now they were primarily a feminine concern, and thus had to be discredited as unfit for a new simpler version of femininity.Įnlightened philosophes were among some of the most virulent critics. Though élite men continued to wear wigs and powder well into the revolutionary years, by the 1780s most had given up the rouge and paint that had previously ornamented the face. Critics specifically argued that men were feminized and weakened through their participation in beautification. Men were the first to be lambasted for their proclivity for make-up. 5 Increasingly, however, secular critics became prominent, arguing for a complete rejection of all forms of artifice by men and women alike. Religious arguments against wearing make-up were common in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century. ![]() Attacks against cosmetics were not new, going back to their introduction into French high society in the sixteenth century. 3Īs cosmetics became more visible in shops and on toilette tables, 4 so did their critics. None the less, by the late eighteenth century all but the very poor participated in the pleasures of make-up. The third estate wore its make-up differently than the aristocracy, preferring tones of pink to red, and circular patterns to streaks. Artisans and servants could buy white face paint and rouge cheaply in the stores of perfumers or on street corners from itinerant sellers. The growth of demand for populuxe goods in the mid-century, allowed the middle and artisan classes to participate in the practices of the wealthy, especially when it came to fairly affordable products such as make-up. Though their fashions differed in shape, men adorned themselves with many of the same toiletries. Beauty patches, sometimes as big as golf balls or shaped like birds, completed the face, and towering powdered hairpieces topped off the look. Increasingly it was the practitioners of medical science who dictated these boundaries.Įighteenth-century female aristocrats traditionally wore thick layers of white paint and large streaks of rouge across their faces, from the corner of the mouth to the tip of the ear. 2 This genre not only provided women with recipes, but set the boundaries for the practices of beautification. ![]() Educated women of the middle and upper classes found solace in the pages of advice manuals. This popularity had its roots in the eighteenth century, when the genre of beauty manuals provided an alternative to calls for a ban on all cosmetics found in tracts, novels and newspapers. The scenes of chaos that it caused indicate the huge popularity in the early nineteenth century of works that proposed to divulge beauty secrets. The Alliance was a history of beauty and a complete guide for female behaviour written by Dr J B Mège, a member of the medical faculty of Paris. The sought-after tome was the Alliance d'hygie et de la beauté, newly arrived in stores. I noticed many women in their carriages, who waited impatiently for the return of their husbands … they had their eyes fixed on the store, their necks craned, their arms outstretched they grabbed rather than received the book, they devoured it rather than perused it … 1 The journalist was surprised to find crowds of people all demanding one book: On 4 September 1818 the Gazette de France reported on the tumultuous scenes occurring outside Parisian booksellers.
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