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Monday, April 30, 2007

Pablo of Elizabeth Arden












I was pleased to find an article on a well-known make-up back in the 60s, Pablo of Elizabeth Arden!


From Time Magazine
Friday, Jun. 10, 1966
Find this article at:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,942028,00.html




A Touch of Sable

He paints, is a huge success with the ladies, is vastly entertaining. He is also 26, handsome, slender, Italian, and of noble birth. A phenomenon of the art world? Not at all. He is Manhattan's newest status symbol: Pablo of Elizabeth Arden.

Known on the Continent as a visa-giste, or makeup man, Pablo does for faces what Kenneth does for hair, and he is increasingly becoming a necessary part of the well-dressed sophisticate's beauty routine. "I've never seen an ugly woman," says Pablo. Certainly not after he is through with her. Pablo takes run-of-the-mill eyes and transforms them into haunting pools of promise fringed by luxuriant thickets. His tools may be available to everyone, but today's makeup look is so complex that it requires the skill and patience of a professional to apply.

Hollywood has known this for years. There George Masters, 27, who transformed Lynda Bird Johnson for April's Oscar ceremonies, currently works over the likes of Doris Day and Rita Hayworth at $100 a sitting. Former MGM and Paramount Makeup Director Eddie Senz, 57, long ago brought his talents to Manhattan, where he caters to Broadway actors and members of the Great Society (Lady Bird attended the Inauguration with makeup by Senz). But it took an Italian who paints crazy eyes for the art to really catch on.



Hateful Eyebrows. The son of Count Zappi-Manzoni, Pablo arrived self-taught from Arden's Rome salon two years ago with a bagful of tricks (beige foundation, pink and white eyeshadow). He took the fashion world by storm with a series of eye fantasies for Vogue and Harper's Bazaar in which he used peacock feathers, sequins, lace, flower petals, even diamonds, all painstakingly pasted onto eyelids in fanciful designs. Some eyes took as long as five hours to do, but they made the magazine covers, earned Pablo special beauty awards and the run of Elizabeth Arden's Fifth Avenue salon. There a covey of beauties (Virna Lisi, Anne McDonnell Ford and Stephanie Javits) flock for his touch at $20 a half-hour session.

Pablo is not a snob, but his views are crisply delivered. "I did jeweled eyes for the magazines, and now women call and say they want them," he moans. "It is not to be believed." Pablo has strong dislikes: "Pink foundation is awful, green eyeshadow is vulgar, eyebrows are hateful, dark lipstick is obsolete." What he favors, and has made fashionable, is makeup that shows yet seems effortless: healthy, glowing skin, light lipstick, and fascinating, fluttering eyes—"the only part really worth making up."

Interesting Defect. Pablo's art requires the touch of a miniaturist, the steadiness of a demolition expert. He has both, plus an assorted palette of six watercolor shades and seven sable brushes of various sizes and shapes—shaving-brush thick for blush powder, pencil-thin for under-eyeliner. Eyes are made up as much as possible: double, even triple rows of false eyelashes ("Doesn't everybody own at least three pairs?"), and the rest a subtle blending of watercolor tones: black eyeliner, then white, light brown, dark brown (in the crease of the eyelid), light brown again, ending with gold or white lightener under the brow.
Makeup must never become a mask, Pablo insists. "Even a so-called defect can be interesting," he says. He had Italian Beauty Donna Livia Aldobrandini's Roman nose photographed in profile for Town & Country. "The more crooked the better," he stated firmly. "Don't try to hide what you think is bad; just wear it proudly."

Vogue December 1964 & Vogue December 1 1965
Vogue October 1 1965