With new film My Week With Marilyn about to hit cinemas, Miss Monroe is once again front page news. And why wouldn’t she, decades after her death I still can’t think of a single actress who has fascinated people in quite the same way.

I recently talked to a friend about her beauty secrets and found out that one of the reasons she caught the light so well on film is that she had lots of fine blonde hairs on her face from using hormone creme. Who would have thought? Here are some more of her beauty secrets:

• Apparently Marilyn was a big fan of plain old Nivea creme. Nivea is pretty big in Germany and my mum and grandmothers used to swear by it. They all had amazing skin so there must be some truth in it.
• She’s also said to have washed her face with Shu Uemura cleansing oils. I’ve been using them myself for a year now and would never ever use anything else for baby soft, super clean skin.
• Marilyn regularly used Erno Laszlo’s Active pHelityl Cream. Laszlo was a Hungarian-born dermatologist who was hailed as the Angel of Beauty when during the Twenties he was credited with curing princess Stephanie of Hungary of her sever acne using his products and ritualistic system. He was a strict advocate of splashing the face 20 times with comfortable hot water each morning, a routine Marilyn is said to have followed religiously.
• It’s said that Marilyn used vaseline as a skin primer. I can see how this might have given her a healthy glow, however it would have also really dried out her skin. Not sure if I believe this one!
• Another product on Marilyn’s skin care routine is Pond’s Cold Cream. Again I’ve used this myself and found it to work very well. It’s such a skin care classic, used by legions of early Hollywood stars – and incredibly good value for money.<

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