Oh Fab, I'm sad...

[tomturbomatic]

There is a fat Christmas tree on a table behind her. I guess the new radio-phonograph was a Christmas present. Maybe the dramatic sling back pumps were also. I think that they qualify for the Joan Crawford Catch me etc classification. So many of the "shelter" magazines used to have ads like this in the November and December issues in the late 40s-early 50s. I really like the style of the old ads. The colors were rich and they seemed to have more substance to them. I do not know enough about the topic to know the terms. I think another thing that has changed is that back then the ads were more geared to adults because they had the money to spend. Now, everything is directed at youngsters with a 3 second attention span.

I have never seen a table base like that one. Do you suppose it is one of those one piece things where the base, table and lamp are all one? The chair looks like late 40s-very early 50 "modren" with no arms.

 

[danemodsandy]

Photo

Tomturbomatic:

The photo is an old ad shot of Rosalind Russell, evidently touting a new console radio. The term you're looking for on the colour is "saturated", meaning how rich the colour is. Old printing processes and old colour photography gave a very saturated result.

That photo looks like it's somewhere in the 1946-1949 time frame. I have photos of Russell in her own living room, and it doesn't look like it was shot there, though it could well have been another area of the house. It does look like a real house was used, though, because of the heating register on the wall; a set wouldn't have had that. That is a VERY expensive decor for the period; getting light fruitwood finishes like that was not cheap then. Most furniture was dark wood at the time, mostly mahogany or at least stained to look like mahogany. That's also very light-coloured carpeting for the time.

I'm amazed that Russell let her feet hang out like that; they look like they're the size of hams. Models and actresses used to be very conscious of that, and posed carefully with one foot behind the other, so their feet wouldn't look so large.

If you'll look very carefully, the lamp on the table isn't quite centred on its top, so it was probably a separate lamp.