The Villa Valentino: a showplace in the Hollywood Hills.

The statue, Aspiration over looking the pool.

  Read more about Aspiration:  http://dispatches-from-hollywood.com/2011/12/the-sheik-of-de-longpre-park/

Valentino's sudden death at 31 from a ruptured ulcer caused worldwide hysteria, several suicides, and riots at his funeral. These same crowds of women haunted the Villa Valentino in Whitley Heights for many years.   Even after Tom Lyle bought the Villa Valentino, he had to keep grieving women at bay.

Read more about the Villa Valentino in The Maybelline Story and the Spirited Family Dynasty Behind It.

Posted by Sharrie Williams at 3:39 PM

A Stunning American Treasure Filled with Nostalgia, History and Marketing Expertise

1933 Maybelline Ad.

Maybelline founder, (1915,) Tom Lyle Williams, believed a woman’s greatest asset was her ability to capture a man’s imagination through her expressive eyes.

By the 1920's women were expressing their creativity through fashion, music, dance, modern art and writing. The film industry was exploding with new found glamour and Super Stars were born. The launch of radio in 1922 as well as newspapers, fashion and movie magazines.  Maybelline, advertised with full page glossy ads, using Hollywood Movie Queens.  the 1930's Maybelline was a household name. Women wanted beauty and Maybelline gave them beautiful eyes and the allure and confidence that went with them.

Empowered for the first time since the Victorian era, women discovered a passion for imitating stars who exuded sex appeal on the screen.

Maybelline provided an inexpensive eye beautifier that enhanced a woman's sex-appeal while movies mirrored  celluloid forgeries professing  nonconformity with old world standards.  As Movie stars became models for America's changing values, Tom Lyle threw Maybelline in the dime stores in 1933 and as little cosmetic companies fell by the wayside or were bought out by Maybelline, The Maybelline Company went on to be the undisputed giant in its field during the Great Depression.

Maybelline founder's 1940 Packard Victoria...Interview with Packard historian, Steve Snyder.

My interview with Steve Snyder, owner of Vault Classic Cars... and  the son of Bill and Jo Ellen Snyder, owners of this beautiful, custom, 1940 Packard Victoria...
once owned by, Maybelline founder and owner, Tom Lyle Williams.  

Chuck Williams aka BB1, Sharrie Williams and Steve Snyder.

Click on the video and watch part 1, of my interview with the Snyder's and my cousin Chuck Williams aka BB1.

Check in tomorrow for part 2, when Steve and I sit in the Packard and get down to the real history, behind this spectacular classic showpiece.

Be sure to pick up a copy of The Maybelline Story and the Spirited Family Dynasty Behind It, on Amazon or Barnes & Noble in paperback, or for your Kindle and Nook,  or buy a signed copy from my site.

Maybelline, Bi-Centennial Wedding of the Year, 1976.

Noel and Jean Williams give their daughter Nancy, the Wedding of the Year, at their Maybeck estate in Montecito California.

The Noel A. Williams family:  Anne, Chuck, their Nana, Alberta Kilroy, Paul and Nancy Williams-Clark, Noel A., Jean and Jim. The Bride and Groom were married under this giant Monterey Pine, dripping with hanging baskets filled with yellow roses. 

Here is a picture of my father, Bill Williams with the Mother of the Bride, Jean Williams.

Noel Allen and his cousin Bill were like brothers.

Bill Williams with Bill Box and his girlfriend, standing next to George Huber on the side.

Father of the Bride dancing with his daughter, before she leaves on her honeymoon.

Here I am with my cousin Nancy 35 years later, still as devoted as ever.  Check out Nancy's comment in The Maybelline Story under, What People Are Saying About The Book!!

Nancy's Wedding marked the height of the Bi-Centennial year, that summer in 1976, and was a turning point for the entire family as Tom Lyle grew weaker everyday, with only weeks to live.  It was a bitter sweet time, knowing everything we had or ever hoped to have, came from the most generous, kindest adored man in  our lives.