Painted Faces: A Colourful History of Cosmetics

by Susie Stewart

Throughout history, women (and men) have applied make-up to enhance, alter, conceal, and even to disguise their appearance. Also, to a greater or lesser degree over time, cosmetics have been used as a visible and tangible marker of social status, gender, wealth, health, and well being. A closer look at the world of makeup gives us not only a mirror reflecting day to day living in the past, but also an indicator of the economic and political climate of a given period in history. Anyone who has ever wondered how the Romans used algae to color their faces and urine to whiten their teeth, how Radium came to be a popular 1930's beauty trend, or how make-up survived the war will enjoy this colorful journey through the human obsession with improving how we look.

Genres: History, Fashion

304 pages, Hardcover

Published April 1, 2018

Reviews

[Sharon Barrow Wilfong · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting, if brief, history of make up.

Stewart hearkens back to the earliest records of make up and records the ingredients used as well as speculates how painting one's face became a thing.

Certainly women and men used all sorts of weird and wonderful ingredients to preserve youth and to make themselves more attractive. The sorts of deadly substances, not to mention gross (dog poo, really?) that people were willing to apply to their faces is fascinating, if not appalling. Lead was extremely popular, even long after its dangers were general knowledge.

Stewart brings us up to the 21st century and the information she provides is certainly interesting. I felt it was a little Euro-centric as well as confined to cosmetic reasons. Surely there were religious reasons and I would have liked to have learned more about international standards of beauty both present and past.

Still, what she includes is informative, even if she speculates to much.

[Conor · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book does exactly what it says: it provides a colourful (and very accessible) history of cosmetics. However, it didn't go into much detail and it's a shame that there are no footnotes, so the reader can't follow things up that they might be interested in. The proofreading was absolutely terrible - so many typos and bad punctuation.

[Erika Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book as research for an article I wrote on eyeliner. While it didn’t have much information on eyeliner (because prior to the 1920s there isn’t much to write on) I kept finding myself getting lost in the historic and cultural world surrounding cosmetics in Great Britain. If you’re new to makeup history, this is an enjoyable and informative book that’s not just an oversize coffee table book. I will say other than the chapter on ancient cosmetics, it does focus primarily on Great Britain, which may not be entirely relatable but did keep the book succinct. I also appreciated that Stewart broke down each cosmetic product within a chapter ie. rouge in the 18th century, which for my research purposes made my life much easier. For research or fun definitely give it a go.

[Lil's Vintage World · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[Mentatreader · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is OK but not great. It suffers from bad proofreading, typesetting issues, and punctuation mistakes. It is also based exclusively on secondary sources. There are also assertions which are obviously nonsensical.

Since it does not clarify its sources I would not use it as a reference. It is fine to give a surface history but should be taken with a grain of salt.

[Lex Gillies · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Caitlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished this book and was left with the feeling of ‘meh’. Nothing earth shattering learned, generally very formulaic writing structure, and repeating the same information that can be found elsewhere. It was a very interesting topic, but in the end, the author did a disservice to it. How many times do we need to hear products made in the previous centuries were toxic. We get it. And a personal pet peeve of mine is starting a book with a definition from a dictionary. Come ON, that is just lazy, and completely unimaginative. I gave 3 stars overall, because it was clear the author was passionate about the topic, but generally this was a book that could be skipped.

[Alivia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed a lot of the content of this book, but the proofreading/editing is atrocious. Many sentences are simply incomprehensible or contain redundant phrases, even exact repetition of the same few words at the beginning and end of some sentences. There are typos, omitted words, and tense inconsistencies. Additionally, there is no discussion of Eastern cosmetic practices beyond the first chapter’s overview of Egyptian beauty routines; the rest of the book is extremely Euro-centric. I would recommend looking for a more professionally edited book on this topic to save yourself a headache.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative

Informative, if somewhat awkwardly phrased in places, is worth a read for those interested in the often dangerous history of cosmetics.

[Tammie Gunter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book . Very informative on many years of make up how they wore it how it was made.

[Isabella · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book! As a makeup artist and someone whose obsessed with cosmetics it was incredibly interesting to learn the history of makeup and how different it's been throughout different periods of time. The book was really well written and gave specific detail which I really loved! I rated it only 3.5 for the sole reason that it was a bit hard to get through. The style of writing isn't particularly "exciting" so I found it hard to pick up sometimes, but once I did I got into it pretty quickly. I definitely recommend this book to any beauty lover/history nerd out there (like myself) as it was very interesting!