In the early 20th century, advertising posters for cigarettes and cigars emerged as a dominant art form, blending commercial interest with the aesthetic movements of the time, such as Art Nouveau and Art Deco. Unlike the text-heavy ads of the previous century, these posters relied on bold visual storytelling and vibrant color lithography to capture the public’s imagination.
Tobacco companies hired renowned illustrators to create iconic imagery that associated smoking with prestige and luxury. For cigars, posters often featured tropical landscapes or regal figures to emphasize the “exotic” and premium nature of the tobacco. Meanwhile, cigarette posters began to shift toward lifestyle branding, depicting the “New Woman” or the “Sophisticated Gentleman” to make smoking appear as an essential accessory for modern life.
These posters were not just advertisements, they were powerful cultural artifacts that utilized psychological triggers, such as social belonging, health claims, and romanticism, to cement tobacco’s place in the daily routine of the early 1900s.
Manufacture de cigares C. Müller & Co, Payerne, Switzerland, circa 1900
Cigarettes Saphir, circa 1900s
Cigarillos Paris, Fides, 1900
Los Cigarrillos Paris son los mejores, circa 1900s
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