Actress wearing cloth headpiece embellished with silver coins, from Stars of the Stage, Third Series (N131) issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote Honest Long Cut Tobacco 1891 - 1892

This small card, dating to around 1888, was made by W. Duke, Sons & Co. to advertise their "Honest Long Cut Tobacco". It features an actress wearing an elaborate headpiece, seemingly made of fabric and embellished with real silver coins. Consider the materials involved here. We have the card itself, mass-produced through industrial printing processes—a direct product of late 19th-century capitalism. And then there's the headpiece. The coins, though valuable, are repurposed, taken from their original function as currency and transformed into adornment. The textile, likely cotton, also speaks to global trade and the labor involved in its production. The image implies the actress has made the headpiece herself: is this an early example of DIY culture? Or perhaps it shows the material circumstances of some actors, who were often responsible for providing their own costumes. The card is a reminder that even the most seemingly mundane objects can reveal complex relationships between materials, making, and social context.