Known for its leather goods, lighters, timepieces, clothing and fragrances Alfred Dunhill Limited is a British based brand that was conceived and driven forward by Alfred Dunhill.

During the 1950’s, Alfred Dunhill inherited the family business, his father’s saddler which was based on Euston Road in London.

The market at the time was demanding much in the way of automobiles and so Alfred founded “Dunhill’s Motories” and his first launch included leather overcoats, goggles, timepieces, picnic sets, car horns and car lamps.

Nowadays the company is owned by Richemont.

The multitude of Dunhill Fragrances, from perfume to colognes, is all sold under the Dunhill brand name.  Dunhill’s skincare items are now marketed and manufactured under a licensing agreement they have with Procter and Gamble Prestige Products.

Proctor and Gamble inherited the Dunhill license during their 1995 acquisition of Wella Corporation.
Alfred Dunhill is involved in sponsorship and is often seen at golf tournaments, such as the Alfred Dunhill Cup.

The Dunhill model at the moment is Jude Law, who is currently appearing across Asia in all their Dunhill ads.
Some of Dunhill’s most notable fragrances include:  Dunhill Pure Eau de Toilette Spray, Dunhill Fresh Eau de Toilette Spray , Dunhill London Aftershave Balm, Dunhill London Aftershave Lotion, Dunhill Fresh Eau de Toilette Spray, Dunhill Pure Eau de Toilette Spray, Dunhill London Eau de Toilette Spray and Dunhill Edition Eau de Toilette Spray.

After thirty years of celebrated success, this international women’s designer fashion group is still worn at red carpet events by celebrities.

With equal success, the fragrances and after shaves produced by this brand are superior.
During 1976, Margaretha and Wolfgang met at a ski resort in St Moritz and fell in love.

On one of their holidays together they bet on a horse called Escada that was running in a large race in Portugal.  Escada means ‘staircase’ in Portuguese.

After winning a substantial amount on Escada who shot in at first place they set up in fashion and their clothing designs became very popular locally.  Within 5 years it was internationally popular and the embryo was born.

By 1980, the brand was established as a leading design label for luxury sportswear and was available in New York, Hong Kong, USA and Asia.

Now there are Escada headquarters in Munich and the Escada fashion collections are available in 500 locations across 60 countries.

It was not long before Escada saw a lucrative market in fragrances as it was already established as a trusted and trendy designer name so following in the footsteps of many fashion houses it launched a line of men’s and women’s fragrances and body products including Escada Sentiment, Escada Signature, Escada Pacific and Escada Magnetism for Men amongst others.

Back in September 2004, we saw the release of the first Britney Spears fragrance, “Curious” which is a gorgeous floral scent laced with vanilla and a musky tone.  Curious was so successful we are told that Britney earned in the region of $12 million USD. Elizabeth Arden is behind the successful scent and they experienced their largest debut in the history of their sales actually breaking a record in the first week the perfume hit the market.  Only one year after the launch date, product sales had netted in access of $100 million USD.

Then, across the board her perfume made number one in the fragrance steaks throughout the whole of 2004 - 2005 in every department store.

The Fragrance Foundation went on to honour “Curious” with the award of “Best Women’s Fragrance.”
So it wasn’t long with such immense success that the Elizabeth Arden / Britney Spears collaboration were keen to launch her next fragrance which came quickly a year later in September 2005 when “Fantasy” hit the market.

Still the sales in Curious have climbed rapidly and have single handedly covered Elizabeth Arden’s normal turnover of sales before any of its products were taken into consideration over the course of the Christmas Season in 2004. Spears / Arden had carefully chosen their customers who were typically 15 – 25 year old fashion conscious females.

It’s a sad fact that we all have to come to terms with, as every person gets older their skin starts to wrinkle and, in turn, is not as smooth and does become less attractive, losing it’s youthful ‘glow.’  What ruins a person’s complexion in the most notable way, are wrinkles.

There are several factors that increase the possibility of earlier wrinkling (even though modern day skin care does slow this down substantially), these are:

a)    Smoking – it is known to age a person up to 20 years
b)    Environment
c)    Hectic lifestyle
d)    Lack of sleep
e)    Lack of water
f)    Sun Exposure
g)    No Skin Care regime
h)    Genetics

Since there is something you can do about the listed items from a to g, this means that you have a good fighting chance in using a great skin care routine and taking care of your body and health.  Even if you find you are stuck in your environment, make sure you get away at weekends for the odd country walk in fresh air.

As skin starts to lose elasticity in the aging process, it is still not too late.  If you start to drink plenty of water and give your face a ‘muscle’ work out by stretching our mouth several times a day you can start to tighten up the neck muscles a little and with some moisturizer and neck cream you will increase your chances of putting the aging process back for a few more years.

It is never too early or too late to start a good skin care regime.

Since ancient times, philosophers have been trying to decide to define what is ugly and what is beautiful. In the 18th century, there was a large emphasis placed on aesthetics.

Socrates felt that the sheer pleasure you experienced from some objects was intrinsically beautiful, finding pleasure in the simplest of geometric shapes, musical notes and colours.  However, Plato felt beauty was more of an ingredient property that is within things and that beauty is relative.  He felt it only exists when compared to ugly things and he felt beauty could only be defined by a property of the entire object.

During 16th and 17th centuries the conditions of “beauty” had become a more specific and formal thing.  Beauty was seen as “arousing” a delighted or pleasurable response.

Addison was said to quote in the 18th century that

“the taste is not to conform to the art, but the art to the taste”

Now the whole idea of beauty was beginning to change again and was defined as a more personal choice of an individual. Hence the phrase

“beauty is in the eye of the beholder”

Now our more modern philosophy in relation to beauty and health involves the ‘wholeness’ and ‘peace’ aspect of our mind, soul and body.  It is recognized that looking after your body is necessary to promote good health but equally what we put in our bodies should be healthy and mentally how we feel can have a huge effect on our health and the way we look.

Around 2,000 fans turned out on Friday 26th September for the Beckhams new fragrance launch, Beckham Signature for Him and Beckham Signature For Her.

Macy’s Square in NY was buzzing with activity even though the weather was perhaps a little damper than would have been preferred.

Rush hour traffic ground to a stand-still across downtown Manhattan, pavements were littered with thousands of multiple colours as people stood expectantly for the speech and the guaranteed appearance of what is now known as one of the most famous couples in the worlds.

Victoria Posh Spice Beckham wore a Giambattista Valli shift style dress in grey with stunning  thigh-high PVC boots, addressing the crowd she said:

“The turn-out has been absolutely phenomenal so thank you so much for queuing up for so long in the rain. It’s great for us to be here. We’re very, very excited. I look forward to meeting you all, so thank you.”

David Beckham, as styled as his fashion conscious wife, wore a classy striped Tom Ford suit, he added after his wife spoke:

“I’d also like to thank everyone who turned up and hope it will be a great day as well. Thank you.”

The couple continued to sign autographs which included signing bottles of their new fragrance.

Victoria was quoted to the press as saying:

“It’s great for me to be able to create a fragrance for him, but he is much more involved than he gives himself credit for.  David has such amazing taste!”

The pair will surely enjoy the continued success that their prominent brand brings, already enjoying huge sales from their previous successful and well known fragrance ranges, Instinctively Beckham his and her fragrances and David Beckhams’ Instinct.

After some trusted recent research by a large beauty institute in America, statistics show that men are becoming increasingly more aware of their own skin and caring for it.  Shopping trends have altered and men are starting to see the difference that caring for your skin can have.  Purchases of men’s skin care products have risen and so has the number of companies now producing ‘men only skin care’ brands and we have probably only touched the tip of what is about to become a larger market.

Statistics now show that nearly 50% of men who are going to an ‘all inclusive resort’ for their holiday or going on a cruise will also visit the spa at least once during that time.

An increasing number of men actively visit spas during the day.  35% of all spa goers are male.  Put this into context, and this is an increase of 300% in ten years.

With 15% oilier skin and larger pores than women , men do require slightly different facial creams than most women do, and, therefore it is not only a marketing ploy to target a different market with the same cream – men’s facial moisturizers and cleansing products really do differ to women’s products.

As the skin care differs, it seems that so do the spa treatments with statistics showing that men preferred a more therapeutic massage where as women see this as more of a ‘pamper’ treatment.