This vintage commercial for Revlon Berry Bon Bon makeup has it all:
- A couple sipping champagne from a fountain which is simultaneously gleeful and surreal.
- A cartoonishly stereotypic chef who apparently created the desserts that inspired the Berry Bon Bon collection.
- And a diamond studded actress who appears out of nowhere to show off her brilliant red lips despite the fact that it’s a BLACK AND WHITE commercial.
There is some beauty science afoot, however.
Revlon claims that their product is the the “only double color” makeup.
The claim could be supported simply by using multiple dyes to achieve a mixture of red and pink. According to YouTube the commercial is from the 1960s so Revlon certainly could have been the first one to combine shades like this.
A more modern, sophisticated approach to achieving “double color” would be to use a refractive pigment like mica coated with titanium dioxide. These are the so-called “duo chrome” pigments which subtly change shade as you change the viewing direction. Viewed from one angle it may have a deep reddish tint while from another angle it could be a little more pink or orange. Certainly this technology was not available back in the 60s… Unless the chef was some sort of chubby time traveler.
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First, I love vintage color cosmetics marketing in black and white. They couldn’t entice the shopper with what the color payoff looked like so they had to use psychology. This could be your fabulous life and you will be adored day and night with this new color.
Second, I never knew how today’s technology worked with coating Mica in Titanium Dioxide to make the pigments multi-faceted.
Pretty amazing.
Great flashback Friday!
Enticing them with a couple of glasses from the champagne fountain didn’t hurt either.
Ah! A fun trip down Memory Lane 🙂 I remember how popular lipsticks that contained two colors swirled together became in the mid-sixties. In some cases the swirls were quite obvious and in others they were barely perceptible. Bright coral with green, orange with ruby, red with pink, hot pink with pastel pink, etc. The theory was that the two colors, when swiped on the lips, would give a more dimensional effect. BTW, green is not as odd as it might sound to the “uninitiated”. It was used to mute colors for a softer “dusty” effect. Many women actually had a medium toned green lipstick in their cosmetic kit until cosmetic companies realized there was a market for more subdued colors and began creating them. As for the spotlight shine on the lips, that was usually created by Max Factor potted lipgloss; a makeup artist’s essential. Memories! 🙂
How lovely to see those beautiful girls, before everyone started to have breast implants !
???? it strikes me as very odd that you are so concerned with their breasts…
awesome post, anyway! i’m off to try to find magazine advertisements for berry bon bon, i’d like to see the color.
NEW Youtube link to Revlon’s Berry Bon Bon fashion fantasy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAdZj9gSJd8