MaryLong cigarettes, circa 2000.
Advertising cardboard for the relaunch of the iconic brand, MaryLong.
The advertising campaign featured the famous 1950s portrait by the British designer Archie Dickens of his wife Dune Ward.
Launched in 1953 by British American Tobacco, the MaryLong cigarette was specially designed for the Swiss market.
The name is a contraction of 'Maryland' (the origin of the tobacco) and 'long' (the cigarettes were unusually long for the time).
The posters for the brand's advertising campaign were designed by Archie Dickens, an English artist best known for his pin-up girls. He drew the face of an elegant young woman with a boyish haircut and doe eyes, holding a Mary Long cigarette between her slender, red-nailed fingers.
The public was so taken with this cherubic face that they associated it with the name Mary, creating a life for her and believing in her existence. Women dressed up like her, and 'Mary' became an advertising icon and a social phenomenon.
- Condition A+
- Code C034500