We love the 50s
I received an e-mail this morning informing me that yet another vintage-inspired boutique bar has just opened in town, which describes itself as “designed to capitalise on the growing trend for all things vintage.â€Â I then checked my Facebook to see I’ve been invited to a vintage and craft fair that’s taking place next week. Next I clicked on my Twitter to find my friend is selling a number of 50’s style swing dresses on e-bay. This vintage bombardment was all within the space of about 5 minutes and is not an unusual occurrence.
You’d have to be living under a large rock not to notice how crazy people are about vintage this and that right now, especially anything connected to the 1950s. Granted, it’s woman in particular that are susceptive to the 50s bug, but with TV shows such as Mad Men proving popular with both sexes there’s no escape for men either.  But why is this? What is it about the 50s that’s so appealing?
Is it the lovely dresses, the emergence of rock’n’roll or the idea of domestic bliss that we ‘re all so in love with?  Or maybe it’s something more deep rooted, such as the fact Britain is said to be less happy now than in the 1950s – despite the fact we are three times richer – and that this is something we’re trying to recreate through memorabilia and cupcakes?
The 1950s were not perfect and I’m no psychologist, but my theory is that in the 50s, consumerism was not only de rigueur, but like Don Draper no one possessed an environmental conscience that felt guilty about it either. And as I sit down to write this, china tea cup in hand, I’m harking back to a time when items were made to last, when rainforests stood tall and there were still plenty of fish in the sea.
3 Comments
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I’m having trouble diciphering the message in this post. The conclusion seems to be that the 50′s got it right because they had intact rainforests and built things to last (like the mass-media and rampant consumerism?) but they also had no environmental consience…? (perhaps they didn’t think they needed one?)
For me, the 50′s lack of an environmental conscience was based in the fact that most people had not yet realised that the things they were (happily) doing, producing and consuming were all laying the tarmac and road signs for the multi-lane highway leading us to the sorry state we now find ourselves in.
So although items were made to last, rainforests stood tall and there were still plenty of fish in the sea back in the 50′s, the course was being set and rising sea levels were just around the corner.
I always find it hard to swallow the old line ‘they don’t make ‘em like that any more’ or the ideal that we should go back to the old ways of doing things (be that manufacturing, farming, transport, whatever) because I believe that everything we did in history ultimately led us to the state we’re in now.
Sure, the way we used to do things seemed fine at the time, but what happens when you upscale the old methods to cope with an expanding population? Luckily, our ancestors kindly did this experiment for us and, hey what do you know, You end up where we are today.
To move forward and to protect our rainforests and the fish (without reducing our own population in the process) we need to develop new ways of supporting ourselves. We need to move forward in a new direction, not take a step back along the same path. Or else we’ll just end up going in circles.
Yes, the point is that in the 50s people didn’t realise that what they were ding what bad for the environment and that’s why we are harking back to it, on a subconscious level. I’m not saying that the 50s got it right, far from it, however, that’s the perceived image of the 50s for people nowadays. Ignorance is bliss and all that…