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ORIGINALLY AN ADVERT FOR MAVIS PERFUME FROM THE VIVAUDOU COMPANY. THE ARTIST WAS PACKER AND THE DESIGN WAS A MIXTURE OF ART NOUVEAU AND THE UP AND COMING ART DECO DESIGN. THE COLORS ARE BRIGHT AND VIVID. THE STYLING LADY WITH THE PARROT EVOKE A STYLE OF THE RICH AND FAMOUS OF THE TIME PERIOD BETWEEN THE DRAB COLORS OF THE WORLD WAR AND THE SOON TO BE FLAPPERS OF GIN CITY.

PLEASE SEE PHOTO FOR DETAILS AND CONDITION OF THIS NEW POSTER

SIZE OF POSTER PRINT - 12 X 18 INCHES

DATE OF ORIGINAL PRINT, POSTER OR ADVERT - 1919

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DESCRIPTION OF ITEM: additional information:

ARTIST; Frederick Little Packer (January 4, 1886 – December 8, 1956) was an American illustrator and political cartoonist. Born in Los Angeles, he was educated at the Los Angeles School of Art and Design and the Chicago Art Institute. He worked for the Los Angeles Examiner, San Francisco Call, and from 1919 to 1931 worked as a commercial artist in New York. He returned to newspaper work on the New York Journal in 1932, and in 1933 joined the Daily Mirror. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning in 1952.

The Vivaudou story ended in late 1919 when Victor Vivaudou, with borrowed funds, was able to purchase from The United DrugCompany the perfume and cosmetics business that carried his name.

In just under five years he had created a phenomenally successful business with his Mavis line, especially, proving to be a favourite among American women. In the process, he had acquired wealth that he could not have imagined while working as a salesman for The Erasmic Company in England and he was living an almost unbelievable American Dream.

His family in England, on the other hand, benefitted not at all with his wife, Agnes, having to practically beg for some financial assistance to help raise her five children. Meanwhile, Victor and mistress Rose acquired thoroughbred horses and motor cars and lived in mansions and ate at New York's best restaurants.

The Vivaudou story starts with the optimistic words, to the American Toilet Goods trade, of Victor Vivadou himself, on the occasion of his acquiring control of V. Vivaudou Inc. He said “…Mr Vivaudou’s control of both management and ownership is complete…Thanking you for your more than generous co-operation and with a promise of greater things than you could ever have dreamed of in the toilet goods industry..”. The next few years were going to be something to behold – or so he hoped!

Immediately following Vivaudou’s ascendancy, American women witnessed a colourful advertising assault in The Ladies Home Journal, and later in The Delineator and other magazines, promoting Mavis. The illustrator, Frederick Little Packer, produced a series of lavish and luscious full-page and full-colour advertisements with almost no copy. Instead, Mrs and Miss Middle America were invited into a fantastic world where elaborately dressed and coiffured ladies in fairy tale settings were associated with two prime words – Mavis and Irresistible. What a campaign! Packer’s advertisements are still in great demand from collectors today.
Victor also took an almost unprecedented step, for a perfumer, in designing and patenting two small vanity boxes – one oval and the other octagonal. Few other perfumers bothered to design their own powder containers but William Roystone (of La May fame) did and so did Frank J M Miles for Cheramy…and so did Elizabeth Arden! But the list is small. Vivaudou’s first two metal vanity boxes were manufactured by E Loesser Mills Inc and were actually marketed as early as February 1920. The oval case was used for Mavis powder and the octagonal for Lady Mary powder, which was still a viable line. Aside from the fact that Vivaudou designed the cases, they were also significantly smaller than most of the brass containers being used by competitors. In my view he was taking a deliberate position to be conspicuously different. But the relative scarcity of these cases suggests that they may not have been popular.
The same can be said for his smaller version of the oval/oblong double vanity boxes that had been in vogue from about 1917. Vivaudou marketed a version for his Mavis line but this too was a short-lived container. In the same time frame, of 1920 to 1921, Vivaudou also marketed a most unusual double face powder and rouge vanity box. It was an alternative design to the more commonly seen oval/oblong cases and this case was based on a design by the prolific inventor William Kendall who had designed so many of Rigaud’s cases and which were made by The Scovill Manufacturing Company. But for this double case, Kendall worked alone and the manufacturer was not Scovill but one of Scovill’s main local competitors – The Risdon Manufacturing Company. This case is also rare because it was produced at the time when women were demanding cases with more face powder and less rouge and the double cases with small compact discs were simply overtaken by the voice of the customer.
1920 also saw the release of another perfume line – Mai D’or. With advertising copy such as, Mai d’or…New, Startling. Its packaging is sensational…This is what the modern woman desires.”, Vivaudou had high hopes for the release but in hindsight it was probably not startlingly or sensationally different enough from Mavis and so Mai D’or – Golden May – gave way to a bleak winter within a few years. Part of the problem was its name. It was not accessible. It did not resonate with women as something they needed to buy. This resulted in a marketing oddity as Vivaudou’s advertising agency tried to rescue lukewarm sales. By January 1923 Mai D’or was being promoted as ‘The Mysterious Door – that guards the most famous secret in the world’. Women were being persuaded that only Victor Vivaudou had crossed the threshold of this mysterious door and entered the secret room of beauty! It was a pretty outrageous campaign that failed to consider American women’s ability to detect horse manure.

There seemed no stopping the continued progress of Victor Vivaudou’s growing cosmetics empire and his willingness to spend lavishly both on the business as well as for his own pleasure. In May 1920 he spent $1 million on a parcel of land in the Bronx for a new factory, but two other events in 1920 would also contribute to his eventual undoing. In early 1920 he had purchased the Delletrez perfume business in Paris and also acquired a larger factory at Asnieres for the manufacture of both Arly and Vivaudou lines. Later in the same year, in December, he received a warning from a very unexpected quarter. D A Schultz, the head of United Retail Stores Corporation, that owned Montgomery Ward, Park & Tilford, as well as chains of candy stores and cigar stores, started buying large amounts of Vivaudou Co stock.

On the personal front, a curious incident gives another insight into Victor Vivaudou’s character. This involved him being found guilty of smuggling. In November 1920 he pleaded guilty to smuggling a pearl necklace valued at $10,000 and a diamond ring worth $500. The necklace was hidden under Rose’s shirtwaist and the ring was in Victor’s pocket. The offence occurred on their return from France in March 1919 but someone had tipped of the Customs authority and the articles seized. He was fined $5000.

The Vivaudou family history has more information on this incident. It seems that Victor needed to liquidate some of the assets he held, jointly, with his deserted wife, Agnes and he convinced her to allow him to sell a house they owned. Other family members immediately suspected that Victor would try and smuggle the money into the US, probably by buying diamonds. They were right. But coincidentally, Agnes had engaged a lawyer to begin proceedings for a divorce and the lawyer had arranged to meet Victor in his hotel in France. It was there that he became aware of Victor’s jewellery purchases and he alerted his New York office, which, in turn, alerted US Customs. Obviously, Victor Vivaudou, was not afraid to bend and, if necessary, break the law if it suited his purpose. And his purpose was to become rich.

The early 1920s saw Victor Vivaudou take a number of decisions that would eventually backfire on him. In 1922 he entered into an arrangement to distribute two products – the first on behalf of Scott’s Preparations Inc was a beauty clay called Mineralava and the second was a line of toilet preparations (including an ankle reducing cream and a bust beautifier and fortifier!) named Ego. Neither venture would prove to be profitable nor, indeed, were his investments in France which were also costing the company money. Despite warning signals that the company may be in financial difficulties Vivaudou leased new and expensive offices on Fifth Avenue, opposite the New York Public Library, in June 1923. In December 1923 the Federal Trade Commission found that the company was using unfair sales methods and in May the following year the company was sued by Scott’s Preparations who were alleging that Vivaudou was not living up to its obligations to distribute Mineralava products.

In this turbulent period Vivaudou was advertising five fragrances under his own name with his address being given as the ubiquitous 15 Rue Royale, Paris. ‘Mavis’, was headlined as the major product and ‘Lady Mary’ appeared in small letters together with a new line named ‘Mai D’or’. In addition, Vivaudou also identified ‘Lilas Arly’ and ‘La Boheme’. These fragrances were marketed in France under the Arly brand and ‘La Boheme’ would eventually prove to be Arly’s most successful fragrance. Interestingly, there is no evidence that Vivaudou ever used the Arly fragrances with powders in vanity cases. As for the ‘Mai D’or’ fragrance, advertisements dated 1923 show a single, metal, case containing pressed powder imprinted with ‘Mai D’or’ and a number of other variations were also produced.

Compacts and vanity cases marketed in this period were far more conventional and, indeed, are hard to distinguish from their competitor’s. The early 1920s saw the rise of the 2½” double compact with double mirrors or double-sided mirrors that rotated or swivelled depending on the particular design. In Vivaudou’s case the most noticeable feature was his creation of the term ‘Pattie’ to describe his compressed powder. In addition, the cursive script of the name ‘Vivaudou’ on the side of these cases not only identifies the brand but also it appears to have been based on the signature of Victor Vivaudou, himself. Cases manufactured for Vivaudou in the period 1921 to 1924 were the products of The Risdon Manufacturing Company. As many of these cases were exclusive to Vivaudou, it would have made them relatively expensive. This is yet another example of Vivaudou sparing no expense to achieve his financial dreams but he was forgetting that he was running a business and his business was being scrutinised.

By 1924 Vivaoudou’s stockholders and investors began wondering whether the company was being managed effectively and the battle lines for control of V Vivaudou Inc were drawn.

While Vivaudou's reputation as a perfumer still carried weight, his financial management skills left much to be desired. His company, V Vivaudou, was losing money and the financial results for 1924 showed a loss of almost $450,000 with sales just half of what they had been in 1923. The acquisition of Delettrez had also been a drain on V Vivaudou financials. Having invested $375,000 in a new factory for Delletrez sales had been disastrous with only $61,000 in 1923!

The business men on the Vivaudou Board were not impressed and nor was David Schulte, as a major shareholder. An insight into Schulte's motivation in becoming involved with V Vivaudou Inc comes from a response to a question about why he decided to enter the cosmetics field. He said “I saw in it an excellent opportunity for the investment of capital and for making money. I felt that the toilet goods business was still in its infancy.”

It was clear that Victor had to go but he was still the majority shareholder. The trump card that Victor's detractors had was probably the fact that his term as President and General Manager expired in 1924. The loss of these influential positions together with the continuing attacks on his management competence, eventually forced Victor to sell his shares to David Schulte’s United Retail Stores Corporation and in October 1924 he resigned as President and General Manager of V Vivaudou Inc and left the company.

It had taken less than five years but Victor Vivaudou had lost his perfume business. Worse, still, he had lost the right to use the name Victor Vivaudou because of the terms under which the company had been created back in 1919. The loss of the business was bad enough but the thought that someone else would be marketing products with the name Victor Vivaudou would have been humiliating and something he could not tolerate. Armed with the cash he received from the sale of his shares, Victor Vivaudou planned to fight. He also resolved to become an American citizen and called into the Naturalisation Bureau in the federal Building in New York and obtained his first citizenship papers.

The Art Deco style, which originated in France just before World War I, had an important impact on architecture and design in the United States in the 1920s and 1930s. The most famous examples are the skyscrapers of New York City including the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, and Rockefeller Center. It combined modern aesthetics, fine craftsmanship and expensive materials, and became the symbol of luxury and modernity. While rarely used in residences, it was frequently used for office buildings, government buildings, train stations, movie theaters, diners and department stores. It also was frequently used in furniture, and in the design of automobiles, ocean liners, and everyday objects such as toasters and radio sets. In the late 1930s, during the Great Depression, it featured prominently in the architecture of the immense public works projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administration and the Public Works Administration, such as the Golden Gate Bridge and Hoover Dam. The style competed throughout the period with the modernist architecture, and came to an abrupt end in 1939 with the beginning of World War II. The style was rediscovered in the 1960s, and many of the original buildings have been restored and are now historical landmarks.

The Art Deco style had been born in Paris, but no buildings were permitted in that city which were higher than Notre Dame Cathedral (with the sole exception of the Eiffel Tower). As a result, the United States soon took the lead in building tall buildings. The first skyscrapers had been built in Chicago in the 1880s in the Beaux-Arts or neoclassical style. In the 1920s, New York architects used the new Art Deco style to build the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building. The Empire State building was the tallest building in the world for forty years.

The decoration of the interior and exterior of the skyscrapers was classic Art Deco, with geometric shapes and zigzag patterns. The Chrysler Building, by William Van Alen (1928–30), updated the traditional gargoyles on Gothic cathedrals with sculptures on the building corners in the shape of Chrysler radiator ornaments.

Another major landmark of the style was the RCA Victor Building (now the General Electric Building), by John Walter Cross. It was covered from top to bottom with zig-zags and geometric patterns, and had a highly ornamental crown with geometric spires and lightning bolts of stone. The exterior featured bas-relief sculptures by Leo Friedlander and Lee Lawrie, and a mosaic by Barry Faulkner that required more than a million pieces of enamel and glass.

While the skyscraper Art Deco style was mostly used for corporate office buildings, it also became popular for government buildings, since all city offices could be contained in one building on a minimal amount of land. The city halls of Los Angeles, California and Buffalo, New York were built in the style, as well as the new capital building of the State of Louisiana.

There was no specific Art Deco style of painting in the United States, though paintings were often used as decoration, especially in government buildings and office buildings. In the 1932 the Public Works of Art Project was created to give work to artists unemployed because the Great Depression. In a year, it commissioned more than fifteen thousand works of art. It was succeeded in 1935 by the Federal Arts Project of the Works Progress Administration, or WPA. prominent American artists were commissioned by the Federal Art Project to paint murals in government buildings, hospitals, airports, schools and universities. Some the America's most famous artists, including Grant Wood, Reginald Marsh, Georgia O'Keeffe and Maxine Albro took part in the program. The celebrated Mexican painter Diego Rivera also took part in the program, painting a mural. The paintings were in a variety of styles, including regionalism, social realism, and American scenic painting.

A few murals were also commissioned for Art Deco skyscrapers, notably Rockefeller Center in New York. Two murals were commissioned for the lobby, one by John Steuart Curry and another by Diego Rivera. The owners of the building, the Rockefeller family, discovered that Rivera, a Communist, had slipped an image of Lenin into a crowd in the painting, and had it destroyed. The mural was replaced with another by the Spanish artist José Maria Sert.

The Art Deco style appeared early in the graphic arts, in the years just before World War I. It appeared in Paris in the posters and the costume designs of Léon Bakst for the Ballets Russes, and in the catalogs of the fashion designers Paul Poiret. The illustrations of Georges Barbier, and Georges Lepape and the images in the fashion magazine La Gazette du bon ton perfectly captured the elegance and sensuality of the style. In the 1920s, the look changed; the fashions stressed were more casual, sportive and daring, with the woman models usually smoking cigarettes. American fashion magazines such as Vogue, Vanity Fair and Harper's Bazaar quickly picked up the new style and popularized it in the United States. It also influenced the work of American book illustrators such as Rockwell Kent.

In the 1930s a new genre of posters appeared in the United States during the Great Depression. The Federal Art Project hired American artists to create posters to promote tourism and cultural events.