Elizabeth Arden was a beauty expert and a fashion designer. She was born Florence Nightingale Graham in 1884 in Woodbridge, Ontario in Canada. He mother died when she was only six and she grew up with her brothers and sisters and her father. She went to nursing school where she learned about creams and lotions to heal. Elizabeth began to think about using creams for a different purpose. She spent hours in her family kitchen trying to make the perfect beauty cream.
Her family thought she should give up but instead she decided to travel to New York in 1908. Elizabeth opened her own beauty salon in 1910 on Fifth Avenue in New York City. She painted the front door a bright red to make it stand out and she decided to use the name Elizabeth Arden for her company.
She began a partnership with Elizabeth Hubbard. Also in 1912 Arden traveled to France to learn beauty and facial massages, returning with a collection of rouges and tinted powders that she had made herself. Arden brought the modern eye makeup to the United States of America.
When World War II took place, Elizabeth saw the changing going on as American woman entering the work force. She created a lipstick called Montezuma Red so that it would match the women’s uniform when they were in the armed forces. As well she had opened a chain of beauty salons and spas.
In the early 1900s no respectable woman used beauty products other than facial cream. Elizabeth was very successful in selling makeup and expensive facial treatments, creams, and tonics even during those times. She developed makeup in many color that led her customers to buy her makeup.
Elizabeth Arden died in New York City on October 19, 1966 and was buried right here in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. After she died, her estate was worth $30 to $40 million. Her Red Door Salons are all over the world.