Perfection: 400 Years of Women's Quest for Beauty

by Margarette Lincoln

A colourful account of women's health, beauty, and cosmetic aids, from stays and corsets to today's viral trends

Victorian women ate arsenic to achieve an ideal, pale complexion, while in the 1790s balloon corsets were all the rage, designed to make the wearer appear pregnant. Women of the eighteenth century applied blood from a black cat's tail to problem skin, while doctors in the 1880s promoted woollen underwear to keep colds at...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0300264585
• ISBN13: 9780300264586
• Release Date: October 2024
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Length: 368 Pages