Now that I’ve recovered from being ferklempt at the ending of our smashing tea party on Sunday, I’m back to posting. In the time-honored tradition of shaming consumers about their appearance in order to manipulate them into x or y fashion purchase, I give you the before and after’s of Cooley’s Cork Corset.
Fear not, (maybe not so) fair maiden! I’ve got a lung-constricting solution for you!
Success! Now you don’t look like a dumpy disaster who will never find the man of her dreams!! Aren’t you glad you avoided such a fate? #foreveralone
Originally seen on Superitch, this ad for Cooley’s Cork Corset is portrayed in “a circa 1870s/1880s “metamorphic” trade card wherein the before-and-after panels are achieved by folding down part of the card to reveal a second image (a folding-image trick utilized years later on the rear covers of MAD Magazine).” I have to admit, I love the irony of her feeling horrid and uncomfortable with her looks BEFORE she tight-laces herself into a whalebone (or cork?) cage of fashion. I adore corsets myself but I don’t think I’d ever describe the experience as “comfortable”.
