She had a passion for reading. She would often travel to bookstores, read a random book and if she liked it, it was hers. Monroe considered reading her favourite hobby. The book that was reportedly her absolute favourite was Ulysses by James Joyce.
She was also a fan of cold cream, like Pond's, and other iconic products we still use today, including Elizabeth Arden's Eight Hour Cream and Nivea Creme, and even olive oil, which she also reportedly applied to her skin to offset dryness.
Glazed Carrots
Munch on these glazed baby carrots as a side dish or an anytime-of-day snack. Marilyn preferred her carrots raw, often dubbing herself a “rabbit.”
The famous perfume associated with Marilyn Monroe is Chanel No. 5… and it really was one of her favorites!
On KUOW's The Beat, Megan Sukys and Elizabeth Austen listen to Madeline DeFrees read “To Marilyn Monroe Whose Favorite Color Was White” and discuss the poem.
For dinner, she never dined out. Instead of opting for the best restaurant in town, she'd stop at a market near her hotel for steak, liver, or lamb chops, which she'd broil herself using an electric oven. On the side, she'd eat raw carrots. And when she wanted to treat herself, it was all about an ice cream sundae.
Monroe's natural eye color was most likely to be blue, as recorded in her sister's autobiography (48) – “but our eyes were different … Norma Jeane's were blue like our mother's” – and on her autopsy report (49), in addition to Capote's description of her “blue-grey eyes” while wearing glasses (46).
Marilyn Monroe: Floris Rose Geranium
Like millions of other women, Monroe was a fan of Chanel No 5. However, in 2002, it was revealed that she also had a secret penchant for Floris Rose Geranium.
Marilyn Monroe was once quoted as saying, "What do I wear in bed? Why, Chanel No. 5, of course." Got to love that cheeky bombshell, right? And she does raise an interesting question—and no, I'm not talking about where you fall in the PJs/birthday-suit sleeping debate.
The Story Behind Marilyn Monroe's Beloved Ferragamo Pumps
The 5ft 3inch star began buying her heels from the brand's store on New York's Park Avenue after moving to the city in 1954, as well as ordering directly from the brand. Marilyn Monroe wearing Ferragamo's Viatica pumps on the set of Some Like It Hot.
Breakfast: She would warm a cup of milk on the hot plate in her room, then crack two raw eggs into it and whip the whole thing up with a fork Lunch: None Dinner: Marilyn would stop at the market near her hotel on the way home to pick up steak, lamb or liver, which she would broil and eat with 4 or 5 raw carrots Evening ...
1. Stewed Prunes. According to Laren Stover's 2001 book The Bombshell Manual of Style, Monroe would usually start her day at around 8 a.m. with orange juice or stewed prunes.
Indeed, Marilyn followed diets every now and then but she loved to cook.
She favored dry shampoo—baby powder on her roots every two days—and often spoke of her disdain for excessive sun-bathing, citing skin damage. Her grooming habits were especially liberal: She loved “being blonde all over.” (Or so she coyly claimed.)
To get her signature on-camera glow, Monroe would apply thick layers of Vaseline or white Nivea Creme under her makeup, while dermatologist Erno Laszlo kept her well stocked in his Phormula 3-9—a reparative botanical balm, specially created to heal a scar of hers—and Active Phelityl Cream, an all-purpose moisturizer.
A small container of Elizabeth Arden “Pat-A-Crème” Fashion Makeup, an Elizabeth Arden eyebrow pencil in black, and an Elizabeth Arden mascara wand in dark brown.
To counteract her insomnia, she often cracked open a Nembutal capsule (so that it would absorb faster into her bloodstream), added a chloral hydrate tablet (an old fashioned sedative better known in detective stories as a “Mickey Finn,” or “knockout drops,”), and washed them both down with a tumbler of Champagne.
It's said that Marilyn used to add 2 drops of her favorite perfume in her water-bath. Moreover, she didn't forget to apply moisturizing creams on her body and face after bathing, to keep her skin hydrated. If you can, take a hot bath, or also a shower, before going to sleep.
A woman who enjoyed her sleep, Monroe took between five and 10 hours of shut-eye a night in a wide single bed. On Sunday? “[It's] my one day of total leisure. I sometimes take two hours to wake up, luxuriating in every last moment of drowsiness,” she had said in an interview with Pageant magazine.
She was a natural blonde
Monroe, who joined her first modeling agency as a curly haired brunette, was dedicated to doing whatever it took to get noticed. She started lightening her hair in the mid-1940s and was instantly hooked.
Monroe loved wearing basic colors: beige, black, white and nude tones. The last time she wore red was at the 1958 “Gigi” movie premiere in Hollywood because the event called for wearing the color.
Her favourite shade of blonde
In her own words, "pillow case white" was the hair colour Marilyn favoured for her pale blonde locks. According to Vogue, the author Pamela Keogh noted that Monroe had her hair bleached every three weeks and swore by dry shampoo— baby powder on her roots.
According to the author Pamela Keogh, Monroe had her hair bleached every three weeks with a roster of hairstylists including Pearl Porterfield (who also tended to Jean Harlow's pale blonde hair) and Kenneth Battelle.
Violet Eyes
This color is most often found in people with albinism. It is said that you cannot truly have violet eyes without albinism. Mix a lack of pigment with the red from light reflecting off of blood vessels in the eyes, and you get this beautiful violet!
George Zimbel was there on the street among several photographers to document what would become Marilyn Monroe's most lasting image: a blowing white halter dress.