I remember thinking how cute and novel these wine bottle-shaped lipsticks were when they were making a sensation back in the fall. (I do have one on the way but the package somehow keeps getting delayed so here's a stock photo for now.) I'm not a wine person – gives me a horrible headache – but I do appreciate adorable makeup packaging so this gets a thumbs-up from me. I mean on the one hand I'm not fond of wine once again being associated with a clichéd feminine stereotype (all ladies love wine, shopping, chocolate and shoes, amirite?), but on the other hand, this lipstick is just too cute.
Turns out, this isn't the first time lipstick has been designed to resemble booze. I was positively tickled when, during one of my customary Friday night vintage makeup searches on Etsy (I lead a very exciting life, I know), I came across this miniature lipstick cleverly packaged as a whiskey bottle.
It really is mini!
I'd never heard of Carstairs before, but apparently from roughly the '40s through the '60s they did a good amount of advertising for their White Seal whiskey, which is still sold today. In addition to the lipsticks, they offered mini screwdrivers and toothpicks, along with seal clock figurines and the usual print advertising. According to one (no longer active) ebay listing, the lipstick bottles started being produced around 1944 and other listings say they're from the '50s, so I guess they were used as promotional items for a few decades. Here's a photo of one in Madeleine Marsh's excellent book, which also dates it to the '50s.
I'm guessing that for the most part, the lipsticks were provided to bars and liquor stores and given away as a small gift-with-purchase, as there are quite a few full boxes of them floating around. I would have bought this one in a heartbeat because how cute would it have been to display it alongside a whole Chateau Labiotte set?
But the individual lipsticks are obviously a lot cheaper and I have many things I want to purchase for the summer exhibition, so I had to pass for now. ;) As for the lipstick itself, a company called Christy Cosmetics, Inc. was responsible for producing it. I couldn't find much information about it online, other than it was a New York-based company and was also the manufacturer of a line called Diana Deering (who was an entirely fictional character, or, as the patent puts it, "fanciful".)
I'm sure there's information about Christy out there somewhere, but as usual I lack the time and other resources to do proper research, i.e., looking beyond Google. If anyone knows anything about their relationship with Carstairs and how they were chosen to produce their promo items I'd love to hear it.
Uh-oh, we have a situation here. Once again a certain little Sailor is up to no good. "It's just my size!"
I better go get this wrapped up and into storage before he smears it all over his face in attempt to "drink" the non-existent whiskey. In any case, Happy St. Patrick's Day and I hope these lipsticks have inspired you to let your hair down and enjoy some adult beverages tonight!
I'm so not a Trekkie but this little guy was way too adorable to pass up. Please say hello to Dr. McCoy! (I call him Dr. McCook – our Babos shorten "cookie" sometimes to just "cook"). He arrived back in early March but I'm just getting around to taking his staff photo now.
If you're unfamiliar with Star Trek, as I am, here's a good compilation of Dr. McCoy. Seems kinda uptight, no? I find his personality incongruous with that of a happy-go-lucky, very affectionate Babster, but whatever.
I'm not sure what he should do at the Museum. Maybe work in Visitor Services with Space Babo, since they're naturally best buddies. 🙂
Some new staff members arrived earlier this week. Say hello to Cowardly Lion Babo and Origins Babo!
I think since Cowardly Lion Babo is still a bit skittish despite getting his courage medal I will make him an intern. Plus he'll get along well with the Museum's other intern Babo Bear (lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Well, no tigers…) I'm not sure what Origins Babo will do. I might make him in charge of Membership Services.
I'm off to see how they're getting along with the others!
Amidst all the holiday bustle I forgot to introduce our newest staff member, who joined us a few weeks after Thanksgiving. Say hello to Ugly Yeti! As you know, it's very rare to spot a real live Yeti, but we managed to snag one! (And he is indeed rare – he's one of only 50!) He loves forests and snow and all things winter, so he especially liked hanging out with Babo Bear beneath our white Christmas tree.
He might look ferocious but he's actually quite cuddly. 🙂
I think I'm going to put him in charge of museum membership…we'll see how that goes.
Say hello to Babo Bear!
Here's the description from the Uglydolls website. "Babo thinks Teddy Bears are SO awesome!
But carrying them around is such a chore.
First he has to deal with those sad individuals who tease him for
carrying around a stuffed animal…how many times does
Babo have to give THAT speech…right?
You know…the one about how people who mock others or tease…
they only do so because they are player haters and secretly wish
they could do the same? Calling me a baby?
Notice how adults with brief cases never tease people…
it’s always LITTLE KIDDIES. Now who’s the baby.
Then there’s the getting lost thing. Teddy Bears get lost!
Hotels, restaurants, skydiving…forget it! So the easy fix is BE a Teddy Bear!
Mega-smarty combo! Now he can be himself AND get on with the day."
I introduced him to his Babo brethren…so many Babos, the rest of the Makeup Museum staff couldn't fit in this pic!
Like all Babos, he was able to immediately make his way to the cookie jar. I also got him some honey. He is a bear, after all.
He's an unusual size – not as big as a regular Uglydoll but bigger than the Little Uglys.
Since he is just a wee cub, I'm not sure what he'll do around the Museum. Whatever it is, it'll have to be only for spring and summer, as he'll want to hibernate in the cooler months. 😉
If you're not too tired from viewing the exhibition, here are some behind-the-scenes shots I took as I was setting up. I still can't believe how expensive it was to put together…cake plates don't grow on trees! Still, I was determined to have some pretty things on which to put the objects.
I got the green cake plate from Sweet and Saucy, the white one from Williams-Sonoma, and all the silver pieces (cupcake stand, sugar bowl and candy dish) were from Etsy.
The husband gathered macarons from two bakeries: Bonjour Bakery and Patisserie Poupon. I swore I'd never go back to the latter after they messed up our wedding cake, but they do have the best macarons in town so I didn't have much of a choice.
In between figuring out what should go where I made the cupcakes. I got the liners and silver ball decorations from Fancy Flours.
They were pink champagne flavored and yes, I drank the champagne that was left after making them! There wasn't much though, I needed a lot for the recipe and the bottle I had was fairly small. It's a good thing…otherwise I would have been too tipsy to take pictures. 😉
Getting there…
As you can see, the truffles that appeared on the bottom tier of the cupcake stand and on the plate with Shu palettes in the exhibition were Godiva. I had bought them a week before and it was sooo hard to resist eating them before the exhibition went up.
I finished setting up everything and took pictures. Then the sun went down and that's when the exhibition opening started! Makeup Museum staff was very eager to start dismantling everything so they could eat some of the props.
Here's Cookie Chef Babo warning Seasick Babo not to puke on the cookies.
The party's in full swing…
…and petered out after Exhibition Designer Power Babo collapsed from exhaustion. Poor little guy. I guess I worked him too hard.
Still, I think a good time was had by all!
This week's links.
– I'd love to see this exhibition celebrating Revlon's 80th anniversary. Too bad it's in London.
– Oof. Australia-based beauty brand Illamasqua misses the mark with their latest ad campaign featuring a model in blackface. Why, why?
– Add this to the list of ridiculously expensive luxury beauty items: Karl Lagerfeld for Shu Uemura ruby-encrusted false eyelashes, which retail for approximately $1,500. And the lash glue isn't even included!
– On the local front, today is Holiday Heap, the Charm City Craft Mafia's annual holiday show. I was sad to miss it as I was visiting my parents for the weekend, but I took along Zeke, one of our Cotton Monster staff members (Cotton Monster is a favorite Craft Mafia vendor of mine). Speaking of which, I was pleased to see this shout-out to Cotton Monster.
– While he was visiting the parents, Zeke and a couple of Museum advisory committee members managed to suss out a pan of my dad's famous "junk squares", so named because they're filled with sugary junk (graham cracker crumbs, shredded coconut, raisins, chocolate chips, almonds, all held together with a can of sweetened condensed milk).
As you can imagine the entire pan was gone within 2 minutes. They love sweets so!
How was your week?
Saturday was the Baltimore Running Festival! For the 2011 festival, I wrote, "Come hell or high water,
I'll be running the 2012 Baltimore marathon! Fingers crossed my body
cooperates and the injury doesn't flare up too badly again (it's still
not even completely healed), and that something else doesn't start
hurting." Well, unfortunately, back in May my knees started acting up. Back to physical therapy and doing exercises to help my knees. While I can still run through the pain, something I couldn't do with my previous injury, I figured it wasn't the best time to start marathon training. Additionally, I wasn't able to devote the time to developing a training plan due to a major career issue, which also occurred in May and is just now being resolved*. So I had to scrap my hopes of running the 2012 Baltimore Marathon and settle for the half. I was disappointed, but maybe 2013 will finally be my year!
It is a nightmare getting there and back, but luckily we live close enough to walk both to and from the race. We got a gorgeous day for it – sunny and chilly.
I am, once again, in head to toe Lululemon. They really need to start giving me free stuff.
It was getting very close to start time, so I peeled off my jacket. When we still weren't moving after 10 minutes after the start time, I began whining and pouting. I get extremely anxious before races (once I get going I'm fine.) I REALLY needed the race to start so I didn't get too panicky and end up chickening out.
My husband commanded me to stop pouting and start smiling because we would be starting any minute. I obliged.
And we did start, hooray! As we walked towards the start I saw some great signs.
Unfortunately I don't have any pics of the actual course (I run way too slow to take pictures along the way) or the finish – my husband had gone home while I was running and didn't make it back to the finish line in time to see me cross it and take a picture. Take my word for it, it was a nice, fairly easy course with literally thousands of people coming out to cheer you on along the way. What I really liked was being able to run with the marathoners. The half-marathon and full marathon course meet at mile 3 (or mile 16 of the full) so you get to run with them. In addition to their race bib with the number, some were wearing another sign that said "full" on the back of their shirts. The whole time I was running I kept looking at them and really hoping I would be one of the people wearing the "full" sign on my back next year.
Here's the medal, as modeled by Museum Advisory Committee member (and resident tough guy) Jeero:
I love that silly cartoon crab!! All in all, a great race and I would definitely run it again.
*You may have noticed that I was having trouble keeping up with my posts and remarking how crazy things were. Now is the time to come clean – in late April my boss informed me that I, along with several other co-workers, was getting laid off. My last day was supposed to be in mid-June, but fortunately we received enough funding to keep me on until mid-July. Between trying to tie up loose ends at work and scrambling to find a new job, I simply had no time to devote to marathon training. In late August I started working again – it was a temp position, but after a few weeks I was liked enough to be offered a permanent job. :)
I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! I was a little bummed as I wasn't spending it at my parents' house (my dad makes the most amazing Thanksgiving feast ever!) but it was still quite nice. While I'm recovering from a food coma, here are some things from the week.
– British Beauty Blogger showcases these adorable shell lip balms.
- Today I had an awesome time meeting up with the lovely Valerie in DC. We went to Shophouse (the Asian version of Chipotle – I really hope it takes off!), then headed to Paper Source, where, predictably, I went beserk on letterpress cards. Then we headed to Lululemon. I restrained myself but there were at least 3 things I could have bought. All in all a great morning/early afternoon – always wonderful to catch up with good friends. 🙂
– Finally, look who arrived just in time to help me with the holiday baking! Heeee!
When he's not helping me in the kitchen, Cookie Chef Babo will be serving as the head chef at the Museum's cafe/patisserie. 🙂
Oh my! The Museum is being overrun by some new, Halloween-appropriate plushies. First we have this little ghost haunting us (technically he is known as Ice Lodge Babo but he looks more like a ghost to me):
And we also acquired a rather devilish looking winged Babo with crazy different colored eyes!
He is signed by his creator.
Here he is, dreaming of cookies:
So there are my new Museum staff members, just in time for trick-or-treating. I have to think about what their jobs will be. 🙂
(images from etsy.com and labiotte.us)
(image from what-i-found.blogspot.com)
(image from tsdrapi.uspto.gov)
