No news today, don’t feel like swatching any new polish. Mostly I feel like soaking in a hot bath for hours. Wonder if I have a cold coming on? I’m probably just lazy.
At any rate, just for fun I thought I’d show you some vintage nail ads I ran across recently and hope you enjoy them as much as I did.
Ah, yes, the good ol’ days, 1950– when you could get nail polish (and matching lipstick, natch) in any color you wanted, as long as it was red. “Hmmm, what do I feel like today? I know! Red!”
HOLY MOTHER OF PEARL!!! Who thought this was a good idea?!? Of course it’s “hard to chip” — you can’t do a frickin’ thing with lethal nails like that, so you just sit around and have servants do your bidding. Tonight before you go to bed, tell yourselves, “I will not have nightmares about this picture.”
Like red polish? Burn in hell, you shameless harlot. Red-polished hands are the devil’s workshop. Or something like that. Bet you wear red underwear too, you hussy.
This is an odd one. Pity the poor, helpless puppet-women as they decide between pink, pink, and pink. And all the while they are in danger of being impaled by the Three Pointy Nails of Doom.
This 1942 ad is kind of fun. Never mind that “gay” has a totally different connotation now; it’s just a can-do message that, by gosh, it’s wartime and women drive trucks and roll bandages in addition to rock the cradle. So even if you have to wear “neutral [drab] suits and dresses”, you can have a bright happy color on your nails. And only 10 cents! (plus tax)
Another creepy one, this one from 1960. I guess she’s supposed to be looking through an aquarium (Why???) but I get the impression of sharp-taloned hands reaching up from the sea to drag her down into its murky depths. And besides, look at those pointy nails. Somebody’s gonna put an eye out!
Finally, I leave you with my all-time favorite nail polish ad. Ever. It was 1972 and I was a skinny, gawky teenager with stringy hair, and braces on my teeth. I remember seeing this ad in ‘Teen magazine and coveting everything the model had — her hair, her complexion, her nails. And oh, yeah, a shaggy-haired cute guy to kiss my hand, which at the time I thought was the epitome of romance. Sigh….
That was fun. Great ads. Can’t decide which one is my favorite, they are all a little bit insane. Funny stuff. Thanks for sharing. Hope your feeling better soon, and you get a chance to take a nice long soak in the tub.
Omg.I laughed out loud at the first one..RED!..And then the second..and on and on.
I swear, the aquarium one looks like she is about to pop a zit…. NOT that I would have ANY idea what that would look like…….
If you ever feel the need to not swatch,and instead, post commentary on random stuff, feel free ( doesn’t even have to be about nail polish! ).
Thanks for the laughs:)
Enjoyed your post!! Had a very long could have been better day….I needed that! Thanks!! Hope you feel better!!
I love these vintage ads! However, all that fluffy feathery hair in the last one makes me incredibly uncomfortable.
Thanks for the great post–been following your blog for a few weeks now. Like you, I am ::ahem:: NOT 22 but love nail polish and really enjoy your posts and viewpoint. Take that hot bath and feel better!
PS: Those ultra-pointy nails are still around…I wonder how stuff gets done with them too…
Wow, the Chen Yu one brings back great memories for me of my mother. Not because she had pointy claw nails, but because she worked in the Chen Yu factory in Chicago. She was born in 1929, so this would’ve been around the late 1940s. She attached the brushes to the caps by dipping the brush shaft end in clear polish and sticking them together. She said she would ride the streetcar home in the evening, peeling all of the polish off her fingers.
Also love those 1970s ones. Frosty pink Cutex on long oval nails–oh so 70s! Thanks for posting all of these.
Thank YOU for sharing the wonderful memory of your mother!
such a fun post! I would love to find ads from when I was a teen.. mostly just to see if I still have any of their polishes
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