Material Mode

Category: Beauty

  • Charm School Beauty: The Du Barry Success Course

    Prevalent during the 1940s, 50s and 60s, charm schools offered day programs in deportment, vocal coaching, makeup and skincare tips, and etiquette training. Not to be confused with finishing schools—which were typically elite boarding schools for wealthy young women—charm schools were a more affordable avenue for learning the social graces and proliferated in heavily populated…

  • Les Parfums de Rosine

    After a self-imposed hiatus due to a spectacular year-long renovation (and two moves of our entire collection!), Material Mode is pleased to share one of the special items brought into the collection during our time away. A few years back, we wrote about two perfumed publicity fans in our collection from Rosine, the perfume and…

  • The Fit Flapper

    In 1924, American Vogue opined, “At the beginning of beauty lies the beautiful figure. For it is the single thing about a woman that comes nearest to dominating in the ensemble of her attractiveness.” It may not be able to be said more plainly the import placed upon a sleek physique during the 1920s, as…

  • Perfume+Publicity+Poiret

    We were recently gifted two very special objects: two paper publicity fans for the French perfume company, Rosine.  Established in 1911, by the avant-garde couturier Paul Poiret following a trip to Vienna where he visited the Weiner Werkstatte, Rosine was part of Poiret’s greater vision to establish himself as not only a fashion designer, but…