Max Factor

Max Factor is an American cosmetic company, founded by Polish-Jewish Hollywood make-up artist born in Russia, Maksymilian Faktorowicz (1877-1938). He founded Max Factor & Company in 1909. He was a pioneer in motion picture make-up and wig-making and won a special Academy Award for his work in 1928. His clientele included some of the old Hollywood’s most famous stars such as Bette Davis, Gloria Swanson, Mary Pickford, Pola Negri, Ben Turpin, Jean Harlow, Claudette Colbert, Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Judy Garland. That earned him a star in the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He developed a few of his own original make-up techniques, such as flexible greasepaint, false eyelashes, the eyebrow pencil, lip gloss, pancake makeup, color harmony range of face powder and Clara Bow’s heart-shaped lips among others, and was the first one who started to refer to his products as “make-up” instead of “cosmetics.” His sons Davis and Frank were involved in the business and they worked on expanding the company outside the movie industry. In 1927 Max Factor introduced his first cosmetics sold to the broad market advertised with a slogan suggesting every girl could look like a movie star by using Max Factor makeup. Max Factor remained a family business until it was sold to Norton Simon in 1973. During that period, among other products, they launched Halston fragrance, which became the second best-selling designer fragrance in the world. In 1983 Norton Simon was bought by Esmark that merged with Beatrice Foods a year later, which placed Max Factor into their Playtex beauty division. Playtex beauty division was bought by Revlon in 1986. Revlon sold Max Factor to Procter & Gamble in 1991. Designer Max Factor has 11 perfumes in our fragrance base. Max Factor is an old perfume house. The earliest edition was created in 1950 and the newest is from 1988. Max Factor fragrances were made in collaboration with perfumers Jean-Louis Sieuzac and Laszlo Lengyel.