Biography of Elizabeth Arden


31 December 1878 19 October 1966 Florence Nightingale Graham (this is the real name of Elizabeth Arden) was born on 31 December 1878 in Woodbridge, Ontario, to parents originally from Cornwall, in the United Kingdom. Abandoned, in 1909, the nursing school of Toronto, decides to reach to New York's older brother; in the Big Apple, for a brief period working for the beautician Eleanor Adair, before founding the business "Elizabeth Arden", at the suggestion of a friend, Elizabeth Hubbard, and taking inspiration from the poem by Alfred Tennyson's "Enoch Arden". The partnership with her friend dissolves quickly, but the business continues, thanks to a loan of 6 thousand dollars obtained by his brother, who opens his first salon on 5th Avenue. A few years later learns to use facial massage techniques in Paris, where he attended several beauty parlors. Back in the United States, the market of cosmetics new shades of lipsticks, revolutionizing the industry. Thanks to the collaboration with a. Fabian Swanson, pharmacist, realizes an innovative face cream, called "Venetian Cream Amoretta, and corresponding lotion, called" Arden Skin Tonic ": both get an outstanding success. The Arden also gives rise to the idea of the total look, after you create specific Foundation can match the natural color of the skin: a look at which fingernails, cheeks and lips have the same color and are co-ordinated. In 1915 (the year in which he married the New York banker Thomas j. Lewis, and thus becomes an American citizen) the Canadian entrepreneur's business is already spreading across the globe like wildfire: in addition to being advertised by the motion picture industry, has shops in Chicago, Boston, Washington, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Phoenix, Palm Beach, Philadelphia, but also in Florida Arizona and Maine. Outside the United States, the brand spreads to Toronto, Montreal, Lima, Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Nassau, Cape Town, Singapore, London, Johannesburg, Vienna, Zurich, Paris, Cannes, Rome, Milan, Copenhagen, Brussels, Madrid, Biarritz, Tulsa, Cape Town. Each store is handled in the first person by Florence: just to Paris is entrusted to her sister Gladys. Among the most famous of Elizabeth Arden include Marilyn Monroe, the Queen Mother Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, Queen Elizabeth II, Marlene Dietrich, Joan Crawford, Wallis Simpson and Mamie Eisenhower, Jacqueline Kennedy. In 1934, while separated from her husband (getting married again later with a Russian Prince), is being marketed "Blue Grass", which is still considered the American essence perfume par excellence. Having opened in Maine, in Mount Vernon, a particularly luxurious spa called "Maine Chance", the Arden you see assign by the French Government the Legion d'honneur in 1962, by virtue of the important contribution to the cosmetic industry. Dies at the age of 87 years in New York on October 16, 1966. Will be buried under the name Elizabeth n. Graham. In 1971, the company "Elizabeth Arden" will be sold for thirty-eight million dollars in "Eli Lilly", before being sold in 1987 to "Fabergé" for stratospheric figure of 657 million dollars. The company currently belongs to the group "Unilever", which he acquired in 2003.