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In 18th century Paris, the growth of cosmetics mass-consumption and the emergence of a highly competitive beauty market promoted - for users as well as producers - the desire to mark their singularity. The case of red makeup provides a perfect example. On one hand, it becomes the object of a new packaging strategy involving the quality of the product and the producer’s reputation through the means of a signature on the items. On the other hand, producers are keen to answer, even to anticipate the various needs of a socially varied clientele, by marketing all kinds of rouges, thus offering people the new opportunity to see their face as a space for a more personal self signature.