The Stylish 1947 Studebaker and Coordinating Fashions

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Finnfemme: Coordinate Fashions With Your 1947 StudebakerThere was a time when cars were stylishly smart and colorful, not the boring sameness that they are today. This ad depicting the “New 1947 Studebaker” is a case in point. The body design is by Raymond Loewy, who was a famous industrial designer. Not only is the car a fabulous sunny yellow, but is advertised as “fashion on wheels” that mirrors your personality as effectively as a Bruno costume.  The perfect cure for the postwar blues.

The ad ties in an English tweed suit by Bruno, matching tweed flats by Mackey, a calf haversack bag by Phelps, and a felt hat by Hattie Carnegie. All were supposed to go along well with your new Studebaker.

The car itself was in a gay, exciting color. Richly upholstered in soft, harmonizing fabric, with wide deep-cushioned seats. It was a dream of a car to handle – steers, stops and parks with delightful ease – and the comfort of its ride is really beyond description. I would love to own – or at least drive or ride in – this splendid car!

~Marilyn

Raspberry Berets and Second Hand Stores

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FINNFEMME: Raspberry Berets and Second Hand Stores: My Ode to PrinceWith the devastating loss of Prince Rogers Nelson yesterday, I am still in shock. But I’ve been recalling my earliest memory of Prince, when I first discovered him in the early 1980s.

I was shopping at a funky record store in Seattle’s University District when I first heard Prince’s Raspberry Beret. It must have been 1982, as this is when his first version of the song was recorded (it was reworked with The Revolution in 1985). I remember stopping dead in my tracks and listening attentively to the song. The sound, first of all, was unique. The lyrics really caught me though:

She wore a
Raspberry beret
The kind U find in a second hand store
Raspberry beret
And if it was warm she wouldn’t wear much more
Raspberry beret
I think I love her

Here was a guy singing about a girl wearing a beret found at a second hand store, and professing his love. Since I’m life-long vintie thrifter who has always shopped at second hand stores – even when it was decidedly uncool to shop there – I was riveted. Plus I love berets and the color raspberry. I remember thinking WHO is singing this song? It started me on my life-long love of Prince and his incredible talent. His music videos soon became a staple on MTV, and he exploded with fame. But I am grateful I got to hear him in his rawest sense first, at that shabby record store 34 years ago.

Sleep well sweet Prince ♥

~Marilyn

 

 

 

 

Cashmere Bouquet Soap Makes You Popular!

Posted by & filed under Beauty, Daily Life, Fashion, Vintage.

FINNFEMME: Cashmere Bouquet Soap Makes You Popular! Vintage 40s adI love the bar soap ads from the 1940s, because they were so promising of enticing beauty and popularity. I mean, come on people, it’s soap – SOAP! 😀

Cashmere Bouquet bar soap was especially big on promises. This 1946 ad is really beautiful; showing a lovely painting of a fetching woman with her dashing beau. “Adorn Your Skin With The Fragrance Men Love”.

Apparently Cashmere Bouquet had a secret. haunting fragrance made from rare perfumes that drove men wild. You could improve your appeal and popularity merely by bathing in it. Hey, whatever works is fine by me!

~Marilyn

The Feng Shui of Clotheslines

Posted by & filed under Daily Life, Frugal Living, Health.

FINNFEMME: The Feng Shui of ClotheslinesFeng Shui (meaning “wind” and “water”) is the ancient Chinese art of placement. It is based on the principle of “chi”, a life-force energy that flows through your house and surrounding landscape. The idea is to balance the soft, slow, receptive, feminine Yin energy with the hard, fast, active, masculine Yang energy.

I’ve been dabbling in Feng Shui since the ’90s, when it became de rigueur in America. I have various wind chimes, lucky symbols, and pictures placed around my house. I can’t really say if they work, but I have a pretty harmonious life so it certainly doesn’t hurt!

I recently bought a Feng Shui kit at a thrift store, that had two books and several decorative symbols. I placed the new symbols around my house and read the book of hints. The hint that struck me, being a clothesline user, was to: NEVER HANG YOUR WASHING OUT OVERNIGHT. Night energy is excessively Yin, so you should never hang your laundry out after dark. Your washing will absorb the Yin energies of the night and upset your feng shui.

Who hangs their laundry out overnight, you might say? Well, ME, when I was a complete newbie to the air-drying scene. My dryer had bit the dust and I was faced with drying a load of laundry. Luckily it was summertime, so I strung some sort of rope in my backyard for a makeshift clothesline. I hung out all the wet towels and sheets and hoped for the best. The sun went down, and I just left them out there thinking that it would give them more drying time overnight. Bad idea. A summer rainstorm hit in the middle of the night and completely soaked everything. I guess you could say that I learned my lesson the very first time I hung laundry. Since then, I’ve instinctively gathered in the laundry before sundown. The night air is colder and moister, and doesn’t help in any drying anyway.  🙂

~Marilyn

 

My Walmart Spring 2016 Beauty Box Review

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FINNFEMME: Walmart Spring 2016 Beauty Box ReviewI’ve been subscribed to Walmart’s Beauty Box for about a year now, and I’ve always been pleased with their health and beauty offerings. Well, maybe not that one time when there was not one makeup item to be had, but I digress. Walmart beauty boxes come seasonally, four times per year. At $5.00 per pop, it is just the right amount. The monthly $10 Birchbox subscription that I had for two years got to be a bit much for me.

My Spring 2016 Walmart box came last week, and I am quite pleased with it. Like most of Walmart’s boxes it is heavy on the health/skin care side, rather than the makeup/beauty side. It did come with a Neutrogena Moisture Smooth color stick in Almond Nude. I thought it would be dry and colorless, but it turned out to be very moist and glossy with a nice hue. Score one for the makeup department!

There was a 1.25 oz tube of Colgate’s Optic White Express White, which is a generous amount. But I will not be trying this as I am on a very specific toothpaste/rinse routine for my teeth. I’ll pass this on to someone who is game to try it.

The other samples were all skin care: Dove Dry Oil Moisture Body Wash, Banana Boat Sun Comfort 30 SPF Sunscreen, Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser, Jergens Wet Skin Moisturizer, and ROC Chest, Neck and Face Cream. Good choices, and I’ll be using all of them.

~Marilyn

 

1940s Yardley English Lavender Flower Child

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FINNFEMME: 1940s Yardley English Lavender Flower Child, vintage 1946 adWith Yardley of London hitting its heyday in the 1960s and ’70s British Mod explosion, it’s easy to forget that Yardley has been around for a long time. We are talking a really loooong time; since 1770. Yardley’s signature scent – English Lavender – was launched in 1873, and is still popular today.

This is such a lovely ad from the August 1946 issue of Ladies’ Home Journal magazine. The delicate English Rose model is dressed in pastel green and is posing in a carriage. The thing that struck me the most is the lovely wreath of flowers circling her head. It seems very ahead of its time, kind of like the hippie boho “flower child” advertising that Yardley did in the early 1970s. More unusual in that England was suffering from postwar hardship in 1946. It paints a rather surreal portrait, but advertising was never meant to be realistic.

Yardley has had a long association with the British Royal Family, and supplied several British monarchs with toiletries. At this time it had “By Appointment-Perfumers to H. M. Queen Mary-Yardley London” seal. Long Live the Queen! And long live Yardley’s English Lavender!

~Marilyn