💄In honour of how much I've been enjoying @gucci's new Gucci Beauty account on Instagram, which charts fashion & beauty via art history, here is a thread I've compiled on some historical beauty trends I find interesting, with art historical examples of what they looked like. 💄
I should note that this thread is in no way associated with or sponsored by @gucci -- but, Alessandro Michele, if you're reading this... I am more than happy & ready to become a sellout, so please don't hesitate to get in touch. 💸💸💸
MOUCHES (literally meaning 'flies' in French) were artificial beauty marks, made from velvet, taffeta, or silk, that gained popularity in Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries, particularly in France, Spain, England, and Italy.
This painting, by Joshua Reynolds, c.1753-53, depicts Charles, 9th Lord Cathcart wearing a mouche. Mouches were not only worn for the sake of it, but were also oten worn as a way to hide scarring, as is the case here, where it obscures an injury Lord Cathcart received in battle. 
Initially somewhat naturalistic in their depiction of beauty marks, mouches soon became creative in shape: one could buy mouches that resembled stars, moons, hearts, clubs, spades... and even horse drawn carriages. This image shows an English lady during the reign of Charles I.
Barbara Payton attempted a one woman revival of this trend during the 1950s, much to the chagrin of her boyfriend at the time Franchot Tone (ex husband of Joan Crawford) who was a classist stick-in-the-mud preoccupied with ‘elevating’ Barbara and making her more ‘high class’.
HIKIMAYU was a practice that gained popularity at the Japanese court during the eighth century, & remained in vogue for several centuries afterwards. It entailed shaving/plucking one’s eyebrows off, and painting a smudgey fake set of eyebrows up towards one’s forehead.
These woodblock prints by the artist Kunichika’s in the 19th century, for his series ‘Thirty-six Good and Evil Beauties’, depict this look.
These WOODEN COSMETIC BOXES, c.19th-20th centuries, by Kuba artists in Central Africa, depict faces on the top of these boxes. I like the idea of the vessel that carries the items you use to ‘make up your face’ being a face in itself, looking out at you as you do yourself up.
Ohaguro was popular trend at the Japanese court, like Hikimayu it persisted until the late 19the century, but its origins stretched back centuries further. Ohaguro entailed duing one’s teeth black.
‘Kunisada Woman Blackening her Teeth’ by Utigawa Kunisada, c.1820.
‘Kunisada Woman Blackening her Teeth’ by Utigawa Kunisada, c.1820.
‘Coiffure à La Belle Pouele’, was a hairstyle named after a French naval victory, which saw ladies of the French court celebrating by wearing ship decorations in their hair for around a month in 1778.
This was perfect fodder for exaggerated cartoons criticising the monarchy, the image seen on the left shows such an image, c.1780. The image on the right shows a more realistic depiction of what the hairstyle looked like, also c.1780.
Apparently never one to let an occasion go by without a hairstyle celebration, Marie Antoinette commemorated the 1774 inoculation of her husband Louis XVI, and his brothers, the Comtes d’Artois and de Provence against smallpox with a new hairdo.
The hairdo depicted Asclepius’ serpent, representing medicine: an olive branch, representing peace, a club, representing conquest; and the rising sun, representing the king, the latter harming back to the king’s great-great-great grandfather, the Sun King Louis XIV.
No contemporary images of the hairstyle survive, so the above is a depiction created well after the event.
By the early 1770s, inoculation against smallpox was common in Antoinette’s native Austria, & indeed most of the rest of Europe, France was rather late to the game. It was the death of Louis’ predecessor, Louis XV, of smallpox that prompted French royals embracing the vaccine.
HUADIAN was the practice of painting/pasting a blossom shape onto one's forehead, & has a charming (if apocryphal) origin story. The Emperor's daughter was either asleep under a plum tree, or taking a walk through the the palace gardens, when a delicate breeze blew a blossom...
...onto her forehead. This plum blossom dyed the princess' skin, leaving its visage on her forehead for three days, and this look was soon copied by various ladies of the palace. It was most popular during the Tang and Song dynasties.
