Order Your Copy Today
Becoming Elizabeth Arden:
The Woman Behind the Global Beauty Empire
Now Available
Elizabeth Arden, a poor, uneducated immigrant with a deep passion for beauty and an ambition to match, created a global cosmetics empire and set the beauty standard for the twentieth century. She brought about a cultural revolution by making cosmetics first acceptable and then de rigueur for women of all backgrounds. An early believer in holistic beauty, Arden combined skin care with exercise and designed the first destination spa. Men derided her unorthodox business methods, but she became America’s wealthiest female entrepreneur and her many innovations in beauty and fashion are still with us today.
She began life in rural Canada as Florence Nightingale Graham before transforming herself into Elizabeth Arden, the inventor, innovator, and visionary CEO of the company she started in 1910 and ran until her death in 1966. Becoming Elizabeth Arden explains the fascinating life and the astounding business success of this rags-to-riches global businesswoman with a penchant for thoroughbred horses and a driving desire to make women beautiful.
Order Today
Amazon | Apple Books | Barnes & Noble | Books-a-Million | Indiebound | Penguin Random House

In the Media
Podcasts
Becoming Elizabeth Arden
Show: Sighs & Whispers: Fashion, Design & Cultural History, on Substack, hosted by Dr. Laura McLaws Helms
30 October 2024
Dr. Stacy A. Cordery on Elizabeth Arden and the Beauty Empire She Successfully Built
Show: I’d Rather Be Reading by Rachel Burchfield
September 3, 2024 | Listen On Apple podcasts or Spotify
From Kitchen Formulator to Global Icon—The Story of Elizabeth Arden
Show: Formula Botanica, hosted by Lorraine Dallmeier
6 February 2025
Interviews
“Author Stacy Cordery Brings Elizabeth Arden to Life in Latest Book,” WRAM/WMOI Radio Illinois
20 September 2024
AirTalk/LAist Live Interview with Larry Mantle
Tuesday, 10 September, 12:35 p.m. Central
Reviews
“Beautiful Business,”
Wall Street Journal
“First She Called Herself Elizabeth Arden. Then She Built a Beauty Empire,”
Washington Post
Book Review: Beauty Icon Elizabeth Arden Took On The Boys, Won The Derby And Advanced Thoroughbred Care
Thoroughbred Daily News
“As beguiling as a day of luxury beauty treatments.”
Kirkus Reviews