The History of Cosmetic Products

Antique Egypt, year 4000 b.Ch.: first mention ever refering to cosmetic products. The women of a certain social position were applying on their face a green cream, of copper ore, to define their features. They were sing scented oils and painting their eyebrows with a cream obtained of sheep tallow and lead. It seems they used perfume to disguise the facial make-up smell. Ancient Egyptians were using cosmetic products based on mercury.The ingredients of the modern cosmetics are, still, a surprise for those using them: for example, the lipstick contains a jelly-like substance obtained from fish scales. This one, named "pearl essence", is obtained from the herring, being one of the many derivated products obtained from fish. The red color of the lipstick is in fact given by the carmine, resulting from crushing the shells of certain insects. Cosmetic products of external use employes in altering or improving the skin, hair, nails, lips and eyes look.The body paint, used as adnornment or during religious processions, was often used by the primitive peoples. Oil, balm, powder and hair dye were also used. Many of these products originate from Asia, but they are first consigned in Egypt.Ancient tombs were containing vessels with cosmetic products (kohl vessels) and applicators (cosmetic spoons). The Egyptians were using the kohl to blacken the eyes; on their faces they were smearng plants dye, and their fingernails were painted with henna.

Orient, 1500 b.Ch.: in China and Japan, rice flour was whitening the face. Eyelashes and eyebrows were plucked off, the teeth were painted in black or golden, and henna was coloring the face and hair. In other words, the teenagers of that epoch used to look exactly the same as those of our days.

Greece, 1000 b.Ch.: if you belonged to the upper class, probably you were wearing a wig, to hide the fact that you didn't use the bathroom too often. This was tre, in fact, both for women and for men. Here too it was fashionable to whiten the face with chalk or with lead flour (nonetheless, there are no written mentions about possible lead intoxications).If ladies wanted a bit more color, they were choosing the ochre gle and iron cream, as lipstick. They were painting their palms with red henna, to seem younger. These practices coincide, not at all surprisingly, with the discovery and perfectioning of soap. They used charcoal crayons and red paint sticks.

Rome, 100 b.Ch.: Platus wrote: "A woman without color is like food without salt." Although they had got an advanced civilization, the Romans were annointing their cheeks with butter, painted their fingernails with sheep blood and lacquered them with tallow from the same animal. Their special contribution was the mod bath fashion, supplemented with crocodile faeces, with effects not yet known.Men were dyeing their hair blonde, to seem younger. Still, hair dyes were so caustic, that they led to total baldness. The Romans also had slaves for applying makeup. The beauty products reached their apogee during the Roman Empire - coal for face and make-up basis named "fucus" - when ladies already had slaves especially trained to apply various makeup.

Middle Ages: Many of the above mentioned cosmetics lasted over the Medieval Era, the crusaders bringing from the Orient oils and perfumes. During the Renaissance period, coemstics based on lead were used exagerratedly.

XVI-th century: cosmetics were seen as a real danger for health, being considered guilty of blocking the bnlood circulation. In the Elizabethan England, red hair was very fashionable. Ladies with a high social position were rubbing their face with egg white, during the day, and at night they were sleeping with veal flest over their eyes, to rejuvenate their complexion. A contemporary playwright even wrote: "A beautiful lady is like a... delicacy!".

XV-XVI-th centuries: In Europe, cosmetics were used only by the aristocrats. Italy and France became the centers of the cosmetic industry. France perfected the perfumes art, but this also led to creating a lethal weapon: if one replaced the lead with arsenic in the face powder, the person using it was to die in the shortest time.

XVII-XVIII centuries: Cosmetics are used on a wide scale, only with the exception of very pauper classes; make-up and lipstick were used as symbols of youth, wealth and welfare. Books and recipes regarding the preparation and applying of cosmetics were at great demand. This is the moment when appeared the professional cosmeticians, and the luxury cosmetic recipes wetre including also wine or milk baths. After having known an extraordinary swing in 1760, the beauty products used creased all of a sudden during the French Revolution.

XIX-th century: France again. It's there that developed the chemical processes of replacing aromas obtained by natural means with beauty products based on scientific research. The zinc oxyde starts to be used in face powder, replacing in a bgreat measure the lethal mixtures of lead and copper, previously employed. Other poisoning substances are still used in the eyes make-up (lead and antimonium sulphite), lips outline (mercury sulphite) and eyes sparkle. it's very important to look well! The cosmetic and make-up products are meant to improve the body's beauty, being used additionally over the simple daily hygiene. The use of cosmetics is very widely spread out among women, mainlt in the western countries. From this moment on, the cosmetic industry developed permanently, new and newproducts appearing, with ever more varied uses. In the United States of America, marketed cosmetics are submitted to laws regarding the safety and quality of food stuff. Queen Victoria proclaimed make-up as an "indecent" habit. Make-up was considered frivolos and meant especially for comedians and prostitutes.

At the beginning of the XX-th century, the cosmetic industry is led by multinational corporations and brings profits of billions of dollars. During First World War, cosmetic products were already ised in the western countries (althogh, later, in Nazi Germany, they were to be forbidden). In Japan, the geishas were using a lipstick manufactured out of sunflower petals, crshed, to accent the lips, the eybrows and the eyes outline. Batons of nintsuke wax, a softer version of the hair wax, used by the sumo wrestlers, were used as make-up basis. The face and neck were colored with cream and white powder; the red color accented the eyes and the nose. At the moment when the geishas were gradating their special courses and obtained independency, dring the official ceremony they were painting their teeth black. Modern cosmetics aim to keep the youthful and, in a certain measure, incitant aspect of the complexion.Nowadays, cosmetics have multiple forms, from lipstick and lips luster (used to color the lips, with a role in sexal stimulation also); make-up basis, cheeks make-up (used to coloring the face, by lights and shadows plays, that hide small flaws, giving a freshness sensation); mascara (that helps to accent the lashs and eyes outline, their dimensions increasing the face's freshness), then eyelids colors, down to nails paint - to decorate the fingernails and toenails).Now, as we say all this, we notice that the cosmetics industry is dominated by a small number of multinational companies, all having their beginnings in the first decades of the past century. Cosmetics already cross over the limit between the simple retouching of the physical aspect, getting to radically change the looks, as is the case for the theater make-up, used by the actors to get into the skin of the characters they are playing. With the help of make-up, one obtains a lot of special effects, mainly if we take note of the roles where the actor is completely disfigured by the use of the make-up effects. Cosmetics are used also in medical treatments, with their help being identified and fought away certain afflictions.

The year 1920 in America: cosmetics and aromas are manufactured and start to be bought. Not it's the moment for the women to renounce their old victorian image and start working at their looks, also using cosmetics. People are interested, and the cosmetic production is ensured; supermarkets and store chains start to develop.

1927: One invents chemical methods for curling the hair, much more expensive, for the women who wish to arrange their hair in the most natural possible way. 1930: Various movie stars, like mary Pickford, Theda Bara and Jean Harlow, start to influence the style and to use make-up. At last, the white look is replaced with the tanned one.

1935: In Hollywood, one puts into use the "pancake" type of make-up, so that the actors (and especially the actresses'!) faces look better in movies.

1950: Begins the modern era of cosmetics for business. Face powder and make-up, oils and aromas, keep being producedm being essential for the new ones. The Radio sponsors of full lenght movies transmit television's advertising.

1960: In the perfumes industry, this is a time of change, but not necessarily for the better. The purple lips and egyptian type make-up for eyes come back, the butterflies being painted in various parts of the body. One should not forget false eyelashes either. The "food" make-up became again botanical, vegetal ingredients (carrot) are combined to create the return to a natural look, smell and attitude.

1970: Certain ingredients stop being used in cosmetics, to protect the species in danger of extinction, and other species are presently used in labs, on guinea pigs. This era with an eye to the environment discloses the beginning of numerous ecologist movements that demand to the cosmetics industry answers to questions like: "What are you doingwith these innocent puppies and bunnies, to improve your cosmetics?"

1980-today: The solution is the diversity of the new look, so that cosmetics and other make-up products help together to the formation of a huge industry, with sellings of more than 20 billions dollars every year. We are aware that print and television advertising are influencing us. Now, we also use the Internet. It's a normal thing to buy flowers at a florist's, a book from a bookstore, a PC from a computers store. Nowadays, we don't worry anymore about the most recent news about or personal shopping - we have the Internet for this.The general store or the supermarket, starting in the first half of the Fifties, have been able to hold the hottest products and brands of the moment, and keep an "inventory" of the past, in case the products suddenly "run away" from the shelves. There are now more products, more brands, more advertising, bigger revenues and a higher demand for the products on the stores shelves, television and Internet. The game's name is now "e-tailing".

A consumer can virtually buy any product, color, number, brand; the product is delivered, as a rule, in 24 hours. Often, this represents less wasted time than a "trip" through the mall. The convenient factor of your understanding with the e-tailer means a lot. You only select your product and finish with running among the stores, searching for the desired one.

 

This is also the proposition of Ardes Cosmetici, through their virtual store (www.ardes.ro) where you can buy hundreds of products, in special conditions...