Beauty products advertisements from the beginning of 20th century
Despite the fact that nowadays, the rhetoric and realisation of advertisements from the beginning of 20th century would rather cause to laugh than convince to buy, it is definitely exquisitely quaint and craftsmanlike. Advertisements with professional illustrations, Art Deco decorations and interestiong typography were usually pieces of art and one of few possibilities to get to know products available on Polish market (because of lack of TV and large-format advertisements). One of the most appealing categories of such advertisements are those about beauty and hygiene products, which give a view of indgredients, ways and means of coping with different inconveniences and freaks of nature. Apart from that, we can notice that many brands existing many years ago (sometimes even over 100!) thrive till nowadays, moreover gained the name of legendary ones i.e. Nivea, Wrigley or Elizabeth Arden. Most of Polish female magazines concerning daily life or entertainment contain similar advertisements in the style described above, so we present some excerpts from two newspapers: female Przegląd Mody (eng. Fashion Overview) available in CBN Polona and Jilustracja Polska (eng. Polish Illustration) from the Digital Library of Wielkopolska. Those advertisements, apart from encouragement to buy the products, often recommend certain places in which the products can be found, what means that we can compare older shop localizations with actual state of those places in cities.
