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Catalyst
Oscar Wilde Likes Madame Fontaine’s Bosom Beautifier
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Trade card advertising Mme Marie Fontaine’s Bosom Beautifier, a product for enlarging the breasts prepared by Marie Fontaine, Buffalo, N.Y. Buffalo, N.Y.: Cosack & Co., ca. 1883.
Submitted for adoption by Heidi Herr
Oscar Wilde became a major celebrity in America during his Grand Tour of the country in 1882 and 1883, to the extent that his likeness was used to sell a variety of products, including Madame Marie Fontaine’s Bosom Beautifier breast-enlarging cream. The product seeks to restore “where the bosoms have become soft and flaccid, from whatever cause, its use will restore them and hardens the bosom, but gives to them the beautiful transparency so much admired.”
This trade card shows how Wilde intersected both high and low culture at the time of his tour, and how eager the American public was to not just enhance their collective bosoms, but to add a piece of Wilde’s wit and aesthetic to their homes.
