Life, 1917-03-01 · page 2 of 42
Life — March 1, 1917 — page 2: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is primarily a **perfume advertisement**, not satire or political commentary. It's a Rigaud "Mary Garden Perfume" ad from an early 20th-century Life magazine. The advertisement uses exoticized imagery of Hawaii to market luxury fragrance. It features a woman in a decorative circular frame (resembling a halo or portrait medallion) alongside perfume bottles, positioned against a romanticized scene of Hawaiian figures in the background. The text employs orientalist marketing language—describing Hawaii as a paradise of "perpetual Spring and flowers" where inhabitants live "care-free lives." The perfume is positioned as a luxury product that would enhance the wearer's "native charms." This reflects period advertising conventions that capitalized on Western fascination with non-Western cultures to sell high-end goods to affluent consumers.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
ae en | PR TE | <a a In Hawaii “the loveliest fleet of islands that lie anchored in any ocean” —land of perpetual Spring and flowers, where their fair inhabitants while away their care-free lives. Festooned with Iais and midst a myriad of enticing perfumes, these Polynesian Naiads play and disport themselves on the golden sands of Waikiki. } It is a sincere compliment to Master Perfumer of Paris \ 19 Ree de le Puix, Pars end New York that living in such a luxurious atmosphere of fragrance, the accentuate their native charms with,the seductive — comicbooks.com