King Camp Gillette is perhaps best known as the inventor of safety razor. But in fact, this is not true: the first safety razors were invented already in the 1880s by the Kampf brothers. The photographs below are razors circa 1903.

The Kampf brothers, Frederik (c.1851-1915), Richard (1853-1906), and Otto (1855-1932) were born in Saxony. The two younger ones, Richard and Otto, immigrated to the United States in 1872, shortly after the end of the war between France and Russia. By that time they were 17 and 19 years old, and they, according to some reports, managed to serve for several years as apprentices at a knife maker in Germany. It is also possible that their older brother, Frederick, has also arrived in the US. The brothers settled in New York and opened a hardware business. Not a lot of facts have survived from that time, but, judging by the papers, things have gone well.

In May 1880, Frederick and Otto filed a patent for "a new and convenient improvement to the safety razor". This was the moment from which the name "safety razor" was first used. The trademark, filed in 1903, "approved the use of the Star name and mark from June 1, 1880.
The official story described by the American Safety Razor Co. (who took over the business in 1919) states that "the Kampf brothers began manufacturing the Star safety razor in 1875 in a one-room shop in New York." By 1899, the establishment occupied the entire area at 8-10-12 Reade St. A 1911 advertisement by the Kampf brothers read: “Star... has been in use for 36 years. We were experts in knife making before we invented the safety razor." This also confirms that the razor was first made in 1875. (Some collectors note the date 1875 on the top of the handle.)

"Star" used Henson's idea: a hoe-shaped razor with a wedge-shaped blade and a short body (4 cm long and 2 cm wide). The blade was fastened with metal brackets and did not require knocking on the screw hole. A distinctive feature was the shape of the razor body, which functioned as a "foam catcher". The razor was cheaper to manufacture than some of the parts later patented by competitors.

King Camp Gillette

Ever since this man died in 1932, we have often heard that he, more than anyone else, has been involved in "changing the face of mankind." This is none other than the American businessman King Camp Gillette, who patented the very first safety razor in the world in 1901. “I invent something that will only be used once and then thrown away. After that, the buyer will come for the same product again.” This valuable advice was given by William Painter (USA), the inventor of the disposable crown cork, to his salesman King Camp Gillett.

Gillette couldn't think of anything that would meet the "disposable" criterion until he realized while shaving one morning in 1895 that razors could be disposable.

Men always shaved: at first - with sharp shells or fragments of bones, later - with knives, then steel straight razors which were made in Sheffield, England in the 18th century. Straight razors had to be sharpened on a regular basis, and Gillette realized that disposable blades would do exactly the same as Painter's advice. The steelworkers explained to Gillette that it was impossible to make the type of blade he imagined, but the news did not discourage him, and he founded the American Safety Razor.

Safety razor

Then, together with his only employee, William Nickerson, Gillette began to develop a flat double-sided blade and a T-shaped holder for it. The same shape of the razor is now, after more than a hundred years.

In 1926, Gillette wrote about the safety razor: “There is no other personal item that is so well known and widely distributed. During my trips, I found him in the northernmost town of Norway, and in the heart of the Sahara desert. No invention has had the same impact on the shaving process, including the electric razor invented by Colonel Jacob Schick (USA) after he moved to Alaska for health reasons. Convinced that it was unpleasant to shave with ice-cold water, Schick tried to come up with dry shaving products.

With mustache protection

The first version of his razor resembled barber scissors and was never released, but the inventor did not stop and created the first successful electric razor, which was released in 1931 by Chic Dry Shaver, USA.

In 1959, Wilkinson Sword, England, instead of disposable blades, began to produce the first steel blades with long term services. In 1974, Gillette expanded on his original principle by releasing the first fully disposable blade, the plastic holder of which was supposed to be thrown away with the handle and blade.

King Camp Gillette was a utopian socialist who disapproved of waste, a paradoxical point of view for the man who invented disposable razor blades. In 1910, he founded the "World Corporation" to promote global economic planning.

In the same year that Gillette patented his safety razor, another American, Thomas Ferry, invented a mustache protector "designed to keep the mustache away from the lips and prevent food from getting on them when eating." But Ferry was not the first: Harry Jones (England) patented almost the same device in 1872. In addition, there were 43 patents filed for mustache guards in the UK before the end of the century, including several devices that supplied cups and spoons.

Dmitry Demyanov, Samogo.Net (

Surprisingly, people began to shave in the Stone Age. It is not known for certain why the men began an active struggle with the vegetation on their faces. Perhaps they were driven either by the desire to separate from the animal world by removing the external resemblance to wool-wearing animals, or by the ever-present female capriciousness in relation to appearance man and his beard.

At the end of the Stone Age, men began to massively get rid of the "growth" on their faces. Moreover, not the most humane tools were chosen: scrapers, stone knives, mollusk shells, etc. There was also another extremely unusual way: unwanted hair they smeared it with clay, like modern wax for epilation, and when it dried up, it was torn off, of course, with hair.

The Stone Age has been replaced by the Iron Age.which entailed a significant modernization of shaving accessories. People immediately appreciated the strength of the metal, and from about 3000 BC. metal shaving devices have become the subject of constant use. Razors created Scandinavian masters approximately 3500 years ago, are considered the most complex and amazing razors ancient world. On their bronzeblades with the help of both engraving and embossing, mythological scenes were reproduced, and the handles had the shape of a horse's head.

Around 1100 BC, the prototype of modern razors appeared. According to scientists, it was then that people began to use a razor with a handle and one blade. The great commander Alexander the Great was an ardent supporter of shaving, and the soldiers imitated their idol: they wore short haircuts and had a clean-shaven face - so the enemy could not grab the warrior by long forelock and defeat him.

The only exceptions were sailors - the likelihood of cuts and their erosion by salty sea water increased several times, so many of them wore a beard. Others, if they had the opportunity, visited the barbershops.

Barbers in those days occupied a special place in cultural life any city. They were something like a secular institution, where they learned and discussed the most latest news. The barbers of Rome made their own modification of the razor, which was called Roman. Other razors had an arc-shaped cutting edge, while the Roman razor was a straight blade with rounded edge and a handle, which was hardened and then sharpened with a sandstone bar.

Over time, inexorable progress slowly, did its job. Changes have also been made to razors. The secrets of damask steel from India and Persia became known to Europeans, and Europe itself reached great heights in the manufacture of welding steel. Toledo and Damascus steel took the place of honor. The processes of forging, hardening and sharpening of blades were also improved.

For the first time, the idea of ​​​​a safety razor was expressed in 1770 in his work “The Art of Learning to Shave Oneself (La Pogonotomie”) - “Teaching the Art of Shaving” by a French hairdresser named Jean-Jacques Perret. The razor of that time looked almost like a dangerous razor we are used to.

Since the 18th century, the stronghold of razor manufacture has been the English city of Sheffield. Later, a second shaving center appeared - the German city of Solingen (Solingen). The number of brands and manufacturers that existed at that time was so great that today it is difficult to restore the history of their development. Hundreds of small and large enterprises supplied countless razors to the world market. The razors from Solingen are famous for their first-class deep cutting. The rustling rustle they make when shaving has earned them the additional name "singing razors".

Mankind owes a new stage in the development of shaving to the notorious American - King Camp Gillett. In 1895, this amateur inventor came up with an innovation that buried straight razors and gave life to safe razors - he clamped a blade sharpened on both sides in a holder handle.

Gillette patented his invention, which he called "safety razor" ("safety razor"), becoming a monopoly in its production. It took Gillette 8 years to develop and bring the product to the market, so his razor appeared on the shelves only in 1903.

Despite the fact that the innovation did not differ in durability, the success of the razor was resounding: the very next year of sales (in 1904), and the number of razors sold rose to an incredible 12.4 million copies. Customer demand for the razor allowed Gillette to open an office in London and sell his razors to Europeans.

In 1910, American inventor Willis G. Schocchi patented a kind of electric razor. The design had a hand-operated flywheel that forced the blade to move around its own axis. The invention gained great popularity among the male part of the population and occupied a leading position until the recognition by consumers of the first electric razor.

The next round of development of the razor belongs to a military man. According to legend, US Colonel Jacob Schick was so inspired by the riflewith the store that he decided to use similar mechanics in a razor. Replaceable blades were refueled in the handle of the razor, which automatically replaced the blade according to the principle of replacing cartridges in the store.

The blades were sold in cassettes inserted into the razor. No wonder Schick called his razor "Magazine repeating razor". This was in 1921. And in 1926, the same colonel invented a razor design with two knives - movable and fixed. The movable blade, as you might guess, began to work from a small electric motor. Through a fixed blade-mesh with slots, the hairs fell under the movable knife.

These shavers were later called rotary shavers and were the first electric shavers. Colonel Schick's electric shavers went on sale in 1929. However, they did not cause success among consumers, much to the chagrin of the military entrepreneur. People still used Willis Schocchi's imperfect razors and bought Schick's creation rather weakly. Then the colonel decided to team up with a more successful competitor, and a company called Schick Dry Shaver, Inc. was born.

In 1939, the already notorious Philips brought improvements to Schick's razor. Firstly, there were already three blades in the Philishave 7730 model, instead of two. And thanks more holes, the razor did not "tear out" the hairs. Despite the efforts of specialist developers, the first real success for the electric shaver came already in the 1970s thanks to improvements introduced by Remington, an American company.

Around 1950, the so-called "mesh" electric shavers appeared, which were invented by Max Braun - the S50 model. This razor was distinguished by a fixed mesh knife, which was bent in a semicircle and covered the entire area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe shaving head. Adjacent from the inside, a movable knife moved from edge to edge of the head and cut off the hairs. This razor differed from the rotary razor in that it did not cause skin irritation. In the Soviet Union, the first electric shavers appeared in the 1950s and were produced in Kharkov. They were very popular with Soviet citizens, and today they continue to produce electric shavers in Ukraine.

A real revolution was made by the invention of Marcel Bick - he proposed to make everything disposable, and in 1975 he introduced the world to a disposable razor. The fixed head razor was very low cost, easy to use and guaranteed a close shave. It makes no sense to talk about the success that has fallen on a new product: we still use disposable razors today, the main advantage of which is their affordable price.

Fortunately, disposable razors and electric shavers failed to finally defeat the straight razor, which had been “corrected” for centuries, although the popularity was repulsed for a while. Of all the well-known firms in Solingen, only one, Dovo, remains active today. This company once acquired the Bismarck brand, which in itself symbolizes the high quality of the blades. Of course, the company was tight, especially during the Second World War.

And in the next decade, the situation worsened even more: then only 35 people were involved in the production of straight razors. At this rate, by 1987, Dovo was only able to produce 7,000 razors. However, there is now a trend towards the return of the popularity of bladed (dangerous) razors, which have become an accessory for stylish men. So a straight razor may well take its rightful place in the market. After all, it all started with her. Those who are tired of machines, but not ripe for a straight razor, now prefer T-shaped machines.

Yes, people started shaving a very long time ago, back in the Stone Age. It was then, for reasons that are not clear today, that men began an active struggle with facial hair. However, it can be assumed what motivated them: the desire to separate from the animal world by removing the external resemblance to animals wearing wool, or the eternal female capriciousness: perhaps primitive women were not too different from modern ones and did not want to spoil their delicate skin.

Be that as it may, the fact remains: men massively got rid of their mustaches and beards. Moreover, the tools chosen were not the most humane: scrapers, stone knives, mollusk shells (which were either sharpened or used as tweezers). There was another absolutely wild way: unwanted hair was smeared with clay, and when it dried up, it was torn off. With hair.

What the heroes felt at that moment ... most likely, it was the heroes who felt themselves.

Looking at their men, they decided not to stand aside and women. Approximately 5-6 thousand years ago, women came up with the first "cream" for depilation, which included the most terrible components: arsenic, starch and lime. Unfortunately, the consequences of using such a "cocktail" are unknown to us.

But the stone age has changed. The Iron Age brought not only changes in society, but also significant improvements in shaving devices. People quickly appreciated the strength of the metal, and from about 3000 BC. shaving devices made of metal became the subject of constant use (after all, stone devices were very short-lived). Razors, created approximately 3,500 years ago by Scandinavian craftsmen, are considered the most complex and amazing razors of the ancient world. They were found in excavations in the Danish Burial Hills. On their blades, people reproduced mythological scenes with the help of embossing and engraving, and the handles were shaped like a horse's head.

The prototype of modern razors appeared around 1100 BC. According to scientists, that's when people began to use a razor with one blade and a handle. The military played a special role in the history of the development of the razor. In particular, the great commander Alexander the Great was an ardent supporter of shaving, and the soldiers imitated their idol: they wore short haircuts and had a clean-shaven face. By the way, short haircuts had a purely practical value - so the enemy could not grab the warrior by the long forelock and hit him.

According to scientists, it was then that the word "barbarian" appeared, from the Latin "barba" - "beard". And so called those peoples who wore a beard. Only sailors did not become adherents of shaving - after all, at sea it is difficult to drive a razor across the face and not have problems later. The likelihood of cuts and their erosion by salty sea water increased significantly, so many sailors wore a beard. Others, if they had the opportunity, visited the barbershops.

Barbers at that time occupied a special place in the cultural life of cities. They were something like a secular institution, where they learned and discussed the latest news. Roman barbers made their own modification of the razor, which was called Roman. Other razors had an arc-shaped cutting edge, while the Roman razor was a straight blade with a rounded edge and a handle. In the manufacture of this razor, soft and hard metals were forged. Soft layers were located outside, which made the blade flexible and resilient, and the inner hard metal provided sharpness. The blade was hardened and then sharpened using sandstone blocks.

Despite such relatively sophisticated technological solutions, the Roman straight razor was short-lived, quickly rusted and dulled. A barber could easily injure a client with such a razor. Therefore, all barbers could help the client in such an unpleasant incident: they applied masks from fragrant ointment or made a rag compress with special oil and vinegar. Finally, Roman barbers began to use water and a whetstone to sharpen their blades.

There is a version that the Greek rich man Publicus Tisinius Maenas contributed to this, who brought barbers to Rome from the island of Sicily. However, only one thing is important: now shaving and razors have become more perfect. The Roman straight razor has gained popularity all over the world. Of course, over time, inexorable progress quietly took its toll. Changes have also been made to razors. Externally, the razors remained the same, only the material and processing methods changed.

The secrets of damask steel from India and Persia became known to Europeans, and Europe itself reached great heights in the manufacture of welding steel. Toledo and Damascus steel took the place of honor. The processes of forging, hardening and sharpening blades are also being improved. Razor is booming.

For the first time, the idea of ​​​​a safety razor was expressed in 1770 in his treatise "The Art of Learning to Shave Oneself (La Pogonotomie") - "Learning the art of shaving (Pogonotomy)" by a French hairdresser Jean-Jacques Perret. The razor of that time looked almost like a dangerous razor we are used to - in the 17th century they began to fold it after use, hiding the blade.

Among the many manufacturers of razors, the history of which cannot be traced due to their large number, in the 18th century two cities occupied the leading positions in the production of razors - Sheffield in England and Solingen in Germany. Razors from Solingen even got the name "singing": due to the deeper sharpening, the blade of these razors, when sliding over the skin, made a characteristic rustle.

However, judging by the fact that today most people use safety razors, even “singing” did not save straight razors. And the notorious American King Camp Gillette contributed to the decline of these razors. In 1895, this amateur inventor came up with an innovation that buried straight razors and gave life to safe razors: he clamped a blade sharpened on both sides in a holder handle.

Gillette patented his invention, which he called "safety razor" ("safety razor"), and in fact became a monopolist, because. his firm did not sell licenses. It took Gillette 8 years to develop and bring the product to the market, so his razor appeared on the shelves only in 1903.

Despite the fact that the innovation did not differ in durability, the success of the razor was resounding: the very next year of sales (in 1904), the number of razors sold rose to a record 12.4 million copies. Customer demand for the razor allowed Gillette to open an office in London and sell his razors to Europeans.

In 1910, the inventor from the same America, Willis G. Schocchi, patented a kind of electric razor. The design had a hand-operated flywheel that forced the blade to move around its own axis. The invention gained great popularity among the male part of the population and occupied a leading position until the recognition by consumers of the first electric razor.

It often happens that brilliant things are invented by people who are very far from the sphere to which their inventions belong. This happened with the electric razor - it was invented by the military, although the improvement of the razor did not begin entirely with its electrification. According to legend, US Colonel Jacob Schick was so inspired by the store that he decided to make similar changes to the razor. Replaceable blades were refilled in the handle of the razor, which automatically replaced the blade according to the principle of replacing cartridges in the store.

The blades were sold in cassettes inserted into the razor. Not surprisingly, Schick called his razor "Magazine repeating razor" ("The razor is a copy of the store"). This was in 1921. And in 1926, the same colonel invented a razor design with two knives - movable and fixed. The movable blade, as you might guess, began to work from a small electric motor. Through a fixed blade-mesh with slots, the hairs fell under the movable knife.

These shavers were later called rotary shavers and were the first electric shavers. Colonel Schick's electric shavers went on sale in 1929. However, they did not arouse stormy enthusiasm and resounding success among consumers, to the great chagrin of the military entrepreneur. People still used Willis Schocchi's imperfect razors and bought Schick's creation rather weakly.

The colonel did not blame the fate of the villain and decided to team up with a more successful competitor. Thus, a company called Schick Dry Shaver, Inc. was born. In 1939, the notorious Philips brought improvements to Schick's razor. Firstly, there were not two blades in the Philishave 7730 model, but three. And thanks to the larger number of holes, the razor did not “tear out” the hairs. Despite the efforts of specialist developers, the first real success for the electric razor came already in the 1970s thanks to improvements introduced by the American company Remington.

In 1950, the so-called "mesh" electric shavers appeared, the creation of Max Braun - S50. This razor was distinguished by a fixed mesh knife, which was bent in a semicircle and covered the entire area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe shaving head. Adjacent from the inside, a movable knife moved from edge to edge of the head and cut off the hairs. This razor differed in rotary and in that it did not cause skin irritation. In the Soviet Union, the first electric shavers appeared in the 1950s and were produced in Kharkov. They were very popular with Soviet citizens, and today they continue to produce electric shavers in Ukraine.

The stainless steel razor was introduced in 1956. It was created by the British firm "Wilkinson Sword", which was founded back in 1772 and was intended for the production of edged weapons.

The real revolution was made by the creation of Marcel Bic, the man who proposed to make everything disposable. In 1975, he introduced the world to a disposable razor. The fixed head razor had a very low price (like all disposables), was easy to use and guaranteed a close shave. It makes no sense to talk about the success that has fallen on a new product: we still use disposable razors today, the main advantage of which is their affordable price.

The disposable razor and electric razor, which had “ruled” for centuries, did not succeed in finally defeating the straight razor, although popularity was repulsed for a while. Of all the well-known firms in Solingen, only one remains active today - Dovo. This company was once able to acquire the Bismarck brand, which in itself symbolizes the high quality of the blades. Of course, the company was tight, especially in the mid-1940s.

And in the next decade it was even worse: then only 35 people were involved in the production of straight razors. At this rate, by 1987, Dovo was only able to produce 7,000 razors. However, now there is a trend towards the return of the popularity of "fear", which have become an accessory for stylish men and women. a good gift for them too. So a straight razor may well take its rightful place in the market. After all, it all started with her.

For most of the 20th century, the life of a Soviet person was harsh and meager. The men shaved with straight razors and brass razors with Sunrise blades. Women on menstruation days used gauze or tore old sheets into rags. And to maintain physical form in many houses a horizontal bar hung in the doorway. Sanitary pads, sports equipment and floating head razors came to us only in the 90s - along with perestroika. Meanwhile, in the West, people have been enjoying the benefits of civilization, invented back in the years of the First World War, for almost a century.

Safety razor

“Looking in the mirror, I started to shave, but found that my razor was hopelessly dull. I couldn’t sharpen it myself, I had to go to the hairdresser or to the grinder. I looked at the razor in confusion. And then an idea was born in my head. machine with interchangeable blades. I saw it in its entirety, in one second, asked myself dozens of questions and answered each of them. Everything happened as if in a dream ... "

This is how King Camp Gillette, the founder of the Gillette Company, recalled the moment of invention. This was in the mid 1890s. King Gillette was then living in Baltimore and working as a salesman for the firm of William Painter, the inventor of the crown cork for bottles. Safety razors already existed then - back in 1771, the Frenchman Jean-Jacques Perret made a razor, in which only the edge of the blade touched the skin. However, Perret's model was not perfect, and in everyday life men used open-bladed razors. It was dangerous - barbers often injured their clients, the infection got into the wounds.

Gillette proposed the following: a machine consisting of two metal plates, between them a blade - fixed in such a way that only two edges are exposed to the outside. And a removable handle, attached perpendicular to the machine. The design seemed so simple to Gillette that he decided to immediately get down to business. He went to a hardware store, where he bought a coil of steel tape for making clock springs, tools, and drawing paper.

The inventor was confident of success: a roll of tape cost 16 cents, and 500 blades came out of it. However, it turned out that blades require thin, strong and cheap steel, for the production of which in those years there were no technologies or equipment yet. It took six years of experience, $25,000, and the help of engineer William Nickerson before Gillette was able to bring his insight to life. In 1901, he patented the world's first replaceable blade razor, the Safety Razor. And in 1903, the first safety razors went on sale.

Buyers did not like the novelty. In the first year, only 168 blades and 5 razors were sold. It was a failure - so deafening that Gillette, leaving the firm in the care of friends, moved to London, where he was offered a high salary as a traveling salesman. But the very next year, thanks to good reviews in the press - Gillette Company's business began to recover. In 1904, the company sold 91,000 machine tools and 123,000 blades, and by 1908 sales exceeded $13 million.

Truly the same safety razor became in demand during the First World War. Disposable blades - it was just what the soldiers at the front needed. Cheap, convenient, hygienic. The military command liked the razors because they could save on regimental barbers. In 1917, when America entered the war, King Camp Gillette entered into a contract with the US Department of Defense to supply safety razors to the troops. For the Gillette Company, this year was a record year - according to the most conservative estimates, 1 million razors and 120 million replacement blades were sold.

In 1921, Gillette's 20-year patent for the invention expired. Safety razors began to be produced in all countries of the world, and they have become firmly established in everyday men's use. In the 1930s, plastic machines were very fashionable, which were simply thrown away after use. In the late 1940s, razors equipped with cartridges with built-in blades appeared. And 10 years later - razors with a moving head. It is believed that today more than a billion razors are sold in the world a year, and sales of replacement blades exceed 40 billion. Which once again confirms the correctness of the words spoken by King Camp Gillette shortly before his death in 1932: "Of all the great inventions, the disposable razor is the greatest of the little things".

Sanitary napkin

Let's say right away: until the middle of the 19th century, women did not wear pantaloons or panties. And this is understandable - the main women's business was to give birth to children, therefore, for most of their lives, women went pregnant, dressing in loose skirts that easily change size as their belly grows. On the days of menstruation, the absence of linen created many difficulties. However, women somehow got out of the situation. How exactly is not known for certain. It is believed that the inhabitants ancient egypt tampons were twisted from papyrus, and Greek and Roman women - from sheep's wool. In the Middle Ages, European ladies used fabric bandages, which were fastened with ribbons to a belt or corset.

Women owe the appearance of modern pads to the First World War. It so happened that at the beginning of 1914, employees of the small American paper mill Kimberly-Clark visited the pulp and paper mills of Germany, Austria and the Scandinavian countries to exchange experience. There they drew attention to cellucotton - new material, which absorbs moisture five times better than cotton, and cost half as much. The Americans took it home, and when the US entered World War I in 1917, the Kimberly-Clark company began to produce bandages from it for the army - at a speed of 100-150 pieces per minute.

Cellucotton was very liked by military doctors, but even more so by nurses. They came up with the idea of ​​making menstrual pads out of it, which they put into tight-fitting pantaloons (ladies in those years had already shortened them and deprived them of flounces and lace). So when the war ended in 1918, Kimberly-Clark representatives bought up the rest of the dressings from the military. And two years later, a completely new hygiene product appeared on the shelves of American pharmacies - Kotex, feminine pads, consisting of forty thin layers of cellulose wadding.

True, selling the novelty was not easy. Pharmacy salespeople at that time were mostly men, and women were embarrassed to ask them for pads. Then Kimberly-Clark went for a trick. They set up two boxes at the checkout. From one, the customer took a pack of pads, into another she put 50 cents. If suddenly there were no such boxes in the pharmacy, you could just say "Kotex" and get the goods.

By the way, at the same time in the early 20s, one of the company's employees - a certain Bert Furness - had the idea to iron the gasket with a hot iron. The result was the first - thin and soft - disposable paper handkerchief, called Kleenex. Since then, for almost a century, these two things - a scarf and pads - are in almost every women's handbag.

Pilates

"The body is created by the mind" are the favorite words of Josef Pilates, the sports coach who created the popular fitness training methodology. Pilates was born in 1883 in Germany, in the city of Mönchengladbach. AT early childhood he suffered rickets, suffered from asthma and rheumatism. At the age of 10, having decided to improve his health, he began to actively do gymnastics and by the age of 15 he pumped up his muscles so much that he began to earn extra money in art schools - a model for anatomical drawings. In 1912, Pilates moved to England, where he boxed professionally and taught self-defense to police officers at Scotland Yard.

The First World War found Josef in Britain. Together with other Germans who were in the country at that time, he was interned on the Isle of Man. He spent all four years of the war in a concentration camp. It was there, based on gymnastics, skiing, yoga, acrobatics, dancing and weightlifting, that he developed his own training system, later called Pilates. In the same place, from improvised means, like the frame of an iron bed, he made the first fitness simulators. During the First World War, training on these simulators not only helped Josef himself survive, but also saved the lives of his fellow prisoners.

After the war, Pilates returned to Germany, where he trained policemen and soldiers of the German army, and in 1925 he moved to New York. There, in the building of the City New York Ballet Theater, he opened a school healthy lifestyle life. In the 1930s and 1940s, the Pilates studio was very popular. She was visited by ballet and film stars: George Balanchine, Martha Graham, Gregory Pack, Katharine Hepburn.

Pilates gained worldwide fame in the early 1970s (after Josef's death), when dancer Romana Krycanowska opened a studio in Los Angeles and John Travolta, Madonna and Kristen Scott-Thomas and many other Hollywood actors began to train using this method.