“To enchant the asteroids, to cause Martians to surrender, the Earth Girl, Ultima (naturally), leans upon her glorious galaxy of Ultima II cosmetics. Their texture — as vaporous, as weightless, as rarefied as the very atmosphere of outer space. Their delicate, almost transparent colors — madly celestial delights. “Why blast off to the moon wearing anything less?” asks Ultima, modestly, crooning over the creamy, seductive splendor of her Pewter eye shadow blended with pale Snowfrost; her Aurora Beige Creme Foundation; glowing Tawny Peach Blushing Creme: Aruba Red #5 lipstick — as yet another meteor flashes by, unnoticed. All by Revlon.” —Harper’s Bazaar, 1965
Encased in a helmet
Hermetically sealed
She’s the Shrimp
Jean Shrimpton
The face of the Sixties
The shooting star
of Harper’s Bazaar
Art Director Ruth Ansel said in an interview about the 1965 issue: “‘I’m most proud of the cover of the Harper’s Bazaar April 1965 Pop issue with Jean Shrimpton posing as the first woman in space.’” –from Foundation Design, a New Zealand design blog, 2014
Mega-star/super-nova
Supermodel/space cadet
Twiggy hadn’t made her mark
Sally hadn’t made her Ride
Barbarella was a dream
of Roger Vadim
“‘In fact, I’m proud of the whole issue, which was guest edited by Dick Avedon… Everything was exploding that year—youth and sex and politics, race relations, the Beatles. A magazine is supposed to reflect, like a mirror, the time we live in, and if it’s a good magazine, it reflects it provocatively. That’s what we did. But it didn’t sell—it was too avant garde and experimental.’” —Ruth Ansel, quoted in Foundation Design.
Her legs raised hemlines
Her photos raised eyebrows
This one
By Avedon
The astronaut
The astro…not
No one bought
“The daughter of a wealthy English builder, Shrimpton began her climb at 17 as the favorite model and eventual lover of famed photographer David Bailey. Her gangly (5’9½”) good looks and uninhibited life-style, which also included a two-year romance with actor Terence Stamp, came to symbolize the Swinging ’60s. She appeared on 20 Vogue covers, earned a then unprecedented $120 an hour and posed in the earliest miniskirts. The work was 'tough and immensely tedious,’ she says.” —People magazine, 1982
The camera loved her
Her photographer too
She left for an actor
His eyes cobalt blue
Stamp and the Shrimp
Wandered about
In a beautiful prison
Until she broke out
“After a decade of personal upheaval, the former cover girl now spends her days in Penzance, Cornwall, tending to the dozen guests of the Abbey Hotel, a quaint 17th-century hospice she and husband Michael Cox, 35, bought two years ago.” —People, 1982
From Abbey to Avalon
Room at the inn
She watches us watching
She’s Shrimpton again
A pink neon angel
A space age romance
But don’t try to find her
She’s gone to Penzance
“I never liked being photographed. I just happened to be good at it." —Jean Shrimpton
This article appears in Apr 20-27, 2017.