It’s no secret that the beauty business is a huge and thriving industry. We pay $100 for the perfect salon blowout. We spend time at spas getting the best facials and massages. We spend a king’s ransom at places like Sephora and Ulta. And getting a mani/pedi is as vital as food, air, and water to some people.
Yet, just a little over a hundred year ago, women focusing on their beauty, getting massages, facials, and other spa and salon treatments seemed overly vain and self-indulgent. And as for cosmetics, well, only ladies of ill-repute rouged their cheeks and painted their lips scarlet.
Two women changed that type of thinking. Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubinstein believed beauty was every women’s birthright and a worthy goal to obtain, and little bit of war paint never hurt anyone. Both women were from very humble backgrounds who rose to great heights and grabbed the brass ring of success. They did this through hard work, dedication, clever marketing, and yes, quite a bit of chicanery.
Despite their huge success and being women at time when women were only supposed to fulfill the domestic sphere, Arden and Rubinstein were fierce rivals and bitter enemies. And all of this is fully encapsulated in Gill Paul’s latest book A Beautiful Rival: A Novel of Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden.
A Beautiful Rival begins in 1915. Elizabeth Arden and her salons dot the New York City landscape and are very popular with high society. Her line of cosmetics and face creams are also quite successful. Women are realizing that focusing one one’s beauty doesn’t make someone shallow. In fact, it is quite necessary in capturing and maintaining a significant other. And wearing lipstick doesn’t mean you’re a dreadful whore. Painting your lips crimson, pink, or coral might even perk you up a bit.
Arden is relishing her success when an interloper arrives on the scene-Helena Rubinstein. Rubinstein has already established successful salons in Australia, London, and Paris. Now she wants to set up shop in the United States, and New York City is the perfect place.
Rubinstein turns out to be a daunting adversary for Arden. There are rumors that Rubinstein was a doctor and her products are “scientifically formulated,” which may give her a bit more credibility that Arden might lack. Rubinstein also becomes quite buddy-buddy with New York City’s smart set. Arden is not happy about this.
Thus begins the rivalry between Arden and Rubinstein. They were determined to out-do each other, and took to great lengths to screw over each other. They did this anyway they could. They send out spies, they stole employees, and spun outrageous stories about themselves and each other for the press.
But as much as Arden and Rubinstein hated each other, they did share some traits and qualities. Both were shrewd, smart, and savvy. Both of them came from less than desirable backgrounds. Though Arden managed to an old-money WASP aesthetic, she actually grew up poor on a farm in Canada. Helen Rubinstein grew up in Poland and was pretty much estranged from her father after she fellow in love with a Gentile. Both women were unlucky in love, and Rubinstein was hardly a devoted mother to her two boys. And with Arden’s disdain of having sex with her first husband, I wondered if she might be a lesbian or asexual.
A Beautiful Rival is told from the point of view of both Arden and Rubinstein in alternating chapters. Not only does this book examine the foibles, triumphs, both professionally and personally these two formidable women dealt with, it also uses history as a backdrop, including the Great Depression and World War II, and how both of these things affected both Arden and Rubinstein.
Though at times Paul had a habit of telling instead of showing throughout A Beautiful Rival, I still found the story of Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubinstein quite fascinating. Today it is not uncommon to see successful women in various industries, but women like Arden and Rubinstein was quite uncommon a century ago. A Beautiful Rival gives us a glimpse of what it was like for women to succeed in the cutthroat world of business. Beauty can be quite ugly.
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