Santa Rita

2 December, 2008

by Serge

Santa Rita. Good old-fashioned water. Since 1954 pure, clean and light.

Nice try for Santa Rita, but the woman is less 1954 than 1967. Had she channeled Marilyn Monroe in billowing dress, the woman could have convinced print ad sticklers otherwise. No, geometrically shaped dresses and bright colors don’t belong in the 1950s.

Instead, this quaint advertisement invited us to relive the Swinging Sixties. Clearly, the Santa Rita girl is wearing that decade’s hallmark, the all-hallowed Mini Dress. Specifically the model wore a sleeveless shift dress, something you would aptly see on Audrey Hepburn, Jackie O, Jean Shrimpton, and of course, Twiggy. If the photo would go just a bit lower, one would surely see a hemline that rose, dangerously, four to eight inches above the knees—and the conservative Fifties.

This look became in vogue in the mid-60s onwards. The instigator was primarily shop owner Mary Quant, who had the gall to sell mini skirts in London. From Great Britain, the “London Look” became full-blown contagion, after which no fashionable girl on earth would be caught dead with long skirts. At that point in history, it was safe to say the full skirt had run its course.

If anything, the hairstyle just screams “60s!” The flip, as the haircut is called, could easily have been worn by your mom or granny back then. Even the girls of The Jetsons, a 60s cartoon, reflected the hairstyle of the decade.

Inadvertently, designers Pierre Cardin and Andre Courreges, the era’s other mini skirt instigator, created lines with space age themes. It was not unusual for Sixties women to pair their mini dresses with go-go boots.

Austin Powers, a funny send-up of that decade, samples Sixties fashion profusely. If you still don’t have any idea, then get one here.

As for the Santa Rita man, well he nailed it right. This print ad just smacks of 1951’s A Streetcar Named Desire, tight-fitting white shirt and all. I mean, the guy could just pass for a James Dean impression.

In the first place, I don’t think people would give that much a shed about old water. “Vintage water”— that would be another ad altogether.

Advertising Agency: LS&Partners
Creative Directors: Rubens Coppi, Paolo Restifo
Art Director: Paolo Restifo
Copywriter: Rubens Coppi, Gabriele Puzzilli
Account director: Giovanni Lamorgese
Photographer: Winkler&Noah
Published: August 2008