The Price of Beauty - Vintage Style

Recently I purchased a 1957 wholesale catalogue on eBay in the hopes of landing some vintage jewelry ads for research.  I was fortunate in that it contained some jewelry ads, but, tucked towards the back I also found this:

 

 Hmnn, seems to me that  calling it a "marquisette" does not really hide the fact that you are putting a plastic bag over your head.  Pink or otherwise.  Thankfully there is a zipper, but, I dread the thought of how many little girls tried to copy mommy getting dressed for a night on the town!

Nowadays, women would LOVE to open a magazine and see THIS looking back at them:

The "gaining weight" usually referred to the area above the waist, below the shoulders, and, towards the front part of the body. 






And talk about mixed messages!  These days we have fashion magazines with heroin-addicted-looking  thin models throughout, and, articles about how to "love your body the way it is" right beside them!  Nothing new, as women fifty years ago were being encouraged to gain weight, they were also shown this:

I think this woman is wearing more hardware around her waist than I have on my car.  That does not look like it would make anyone feel "light on their feet."  Lightheaded, maybe.  And I for one am not really sucked in (pun fully intended) by the promise of  "It's like having three pairs of hands pulling across the abdomen..."  Um, I'll pass.










Lest you think the men were immune, the 98 pound weakling is no urban myth!  Here -  from the same fine publication as the last two- is what men faced at the same time:

My only question is, did that transformation happen in the same summer?