Fashion Category
Style and celebrity – fashion photos, news and trends.
Vintage Footwear Adverts Unlaced
LADIES – no need to fight. There are shoes aplenty in this article, so there are more than enough for the both of you. Here is a cornucopia of retro footwear adverts that should keep everyone satisfied for a while. From hippy clogs to funky sidewinders fit for the most stylish of 70s pimps, they’re all here. Some of the advertisements are blatantly sexist, some are just plain odd, but there is much fun to be had. Enjoy!
Each Dexter shoe comes with a hotel coupon and a free condom. Plus, the shoes are highly durable and waterproof in case you’re going to move on from Casual Dex to Fetish Dex.
For much of the Seventies, no brand embodied the Black Power philosophy as much as Flagg Brothers and Eleganza. They offered the very best in pimpwear – I’m talkin’ ermine collars, big ass heels and pearl handle canes. African-American fashions were bold and flamboyant during this decade – if the jive-turkeys didn’t like it, they could kiss their black ass.
A completely nude woman hopelessly in love with a guy’s shoes. Is this advert pure genius, or pure sexist? I’d posit that it’s a lot of both.
It’s become a cliché to say that fashion is circular, but it is absolutely true. The 1970s clogs above would have been absolutely mocked and ridiculed in the 80s and 90s. In 1986, you would have been stoned to death and your entirely family imprisoned for sliding into a platform mule. Today, it’s the entirely fashionable…. although, embroidered fruit still hasn’t made a comeback. In due time.
At first this just seems incredibly odd; however, I guess there are stranger things than choosing to paint your shoes. Apparently, they even had “animal textures” – for instance, you could spray on lizard skin. (And at that point, I would start to question your mental condition.)
Amazingly, someone along the way thought having a nude middle-aged man on a ladder was a good way to sell slippers. But, before you start feeling too sorry for yourself for being subjected to this – just think about what a view those poor firemen are getting!
Very few people know this, but it’s a fact that Nostradamus actually predicted the arrival of the denim boot.
In the land with a climate opposite to Babylon there will be great shedding of blood.
Heaven will seem unjust both on land and sea and in the air.
Sects, famine, kingdoms, denim boots, plagues, and confusion shall rule the Earth.
– Century I, Quatrain 55
What significance it has remains to be seen, but the mysterious denim boot will no doubt play a major role in the apocalypse.
It says the footwear was designed especially for Pat Boone. I’m assuming that means it will never become unclean and remain for all time as pure as the wind driven snow. In this advert, Pat demonstrates the magic of Velcro – “the closure invention of the century”. There’s even directions for proper Velcro use: “to close, press together – to open, peel apart.”
These slippers come in a variety of colors: Spring Green, Royal Blue, Cocoa Brown, and Glowing Nuclear Waste Orange. All Minute Crochet Slippers are machine washable and stain resistant, except the orange, which may cause birth defects, tumors and long term environmental devastation.
The infamous “egg chair” was perhaps mankind’s greatest creation, yet it fell out of favor by the end of the 1970s. You were comfortably enclosed within this upholstered ovum, and some even had speakers inside…. a toker’s throne, you might say.
A guy in a leisure suit is framed by a ring of godawful footwear – Worst selfie ever.
This seems to be nothing more than a cheap and shameless ploy to grab our attention by having us look up this chick’s skirt. In a perfect world, all adverts would be this cheap and shameless. I’ll wager this particular shoe advert had more than its share of men examining it close-up for any glimpse of immodesty.
And speaking of cheap and shameless… ¡Ay, caramba!
Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
1936: Claud Butler Cycling Tweed Suits For Whitsun
ANYBODY else think cycling gear has gone downhill since this Claud Butler Whitsun “rigout” was advertised in 1936?
1903: Girlie Mag Vanity Fair Profiles ‘The Bifurcated Girls: Gay Girls In Trousers’
IN 1903, The Commonwealth Publishing Company of New York City’s magazine Vanity Fair (no, another one; this one ran from February 1902 to April 1904) produced the article on The Bifurcated Girls: Gay Girls In Trousers.
Dian Hansen notes inHistory of Men’s Magazines:
While France had a well-established men’s magazine industry by 1900, America was just showing its ankles in 1903. A magazine called Vanity Fair (unrelated to the current incarnation) was the raciest thing around, and rooming house loozies the hotties of the time. In this New York, tabloid girls who drank like men might strip down to their petticoats and fall into bed together, exposing their corset cover and stockings to peeping male boarders. The famously loose morals of stage actresses made them popular subjects for these shenanigans, but the biggest thrill of all was bifurcation. “What?” one may well ask. Bifurcation, meaning “split in two”, referred to the contours of a woman’s legs revealed by her donning men’s trousers. Bifurcation was a regular and very popular feature in Vanity Fair, it’s popularity leading to Vanity Fair’s Bifurcated Girls.
Posted: 8th, April 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
5 Highly Troubling Vintage Adverts
HERE is some free advice for up-and-coming marketing execs: Adverts should not make consumers feel nauseous or deeply uncomfortable. Nor should they cause consumers to experience waking nightmares or abdominal pain. You wouldn’t think this sort of instruction would be necessary, but here are five examples which demonstrate that it is. Please take notes.
1. SEXUALLY AROUSED STUFFED TOYS PROMOTE BEAR HOSIERY
“What a treat to stocking those legs. Wish I were a man,” says the first bear. I’m not sure how I feel about stuffed animals ogling over a woman’s legs. Call me old fashioned, but I prefer Teddy Bears without a sexual appetite.
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Posted: 7th, April 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
These 1970s Onesie Bodysuits Got Men ‘Into Something New’
MEN’S fashion is an endless source of point-and-laugh fun. In this instalment, we hard back to the 1970s, wherein the Onesie For Him was knocking them bandy in the boardroom and bedroom.
Do say: With your Onesie, you look macho and more ready for action than an aroused Playgirl stud. Nice moustache.
Don’t say: Ha-ha. It’s a babygro, you muppet!
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Posted: 1st, April 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback | Comments (2)
I Was A 1960s Mod: Watch The Soul Rider Documentary
The modern fad for having as much sound and light as possible on your scooter reached the Epsom Downs for Derby Day. Proud owners are Roy Young and Linda Jarvis. Date: 31/05/1964
IN the 1960s, Glenn Stewart was a mod. There Is More filmed Glenn over six hours as he recalled him time as a suited and booted, Vespa driving mod.
It’s a lovely short film about one of Britain’s fashion tribes:
Spotter: ModStyle
Posted: 18th, March 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Music | Comment
Mr Porter Fail: How Annette Bening Ruined Warren Beatty’s Reputation For Dating Beautiful Women
READING the Mr Porter mail-out magazine Ronan Fitzgerald @rmkf spotted a segment on Warren Beatty. As he says, “Pretty harsh on Annette Bening”:
Posted: 20th, February 2014 | In: Celebrities, Fashion | Comment
Vintage Adverts: 1970 Landlubber Bellbottoms For Men Who Ride Sidesaddle
“In real life, the guy’s hair would be matted down from the helmet. The chick would be your woman instead of a New York model. And you’d be eating exhaust from a bus instead of grooving in farout fields. However, the Landlubbers are real, and they are mildly but honestly transcendent.”
Posted: 19th, February 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, The Consumer | Comment
New York Fashion Blog Treats Homeless Man In The Most Epically Hopeless Way
WHEN Scott Schuman published a picture on his Sartorialist fashion blog of a homeless man in New York, he called it “NOT GIVING UP”:
I don’t usually shoot homeless people. I don’t find it romantic or appealing like a lot of street photographers, and if you asked homeless people they are probably not to happy about their situation either. That’s why I was surprised to be so drawn to taking a picture of this gentleman.
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Posted: 15th, February 2014 | In: Fashion | Comments (4)
How Mary Quant’s Mini-Skirt Made London ‘Atwinkle With Thighs’ And Swing
Mary Quant in 1963 /AP/Press Association Images
EVERYBODY knows that Mary Quant invented the mini-skirt. Except she didn’t. In reality nobody really knows for sure who produced the diminutive garment first. Some say it was John Bates, famous for dressing Diana Rigg so memorably in The Avengers, while others say it was the French designer Andre Courreges, although Quant would later write: “Maybe Courreges did do mini-skirts first, but if he did, no one wore them.” There’s no doubt, however, that skirts were getting shorter each year in the early to mid-sixties but this was almost certainly to do with technological advances that enabled tights to be produced relatively cheaply more than anything else. Although Mary Quant is often credited with inventing, or at least popularising, coloured and patterned tights too.
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Posted: 11th, February 2014 | In: Celebrities, Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
Groovy Vintage T-Shirt Adverts
MY MOST BELOVED possessions in the 1970s were my T-shirts. They were my identity. My Kiss concert shirt was proof that I’d witnessed the greatest show on earth. My Pete Rose shirt was proof of my allegiance to the Big Red Machine (the Cincinnati Reds). My Mork & Mindy shirt was proof that… well, I guess that I was a complete and total nerd.
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Posted: 6th, February 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment (1)
Swansea Woman Shatters World Cardigan Wearing Record
LOCAL News: Swansea’s Pam Hopkins is “still wearing the same cardigan after 54 years – and she says it’s never lost a button”.
She beats the previous records:
Spotter: @TheMediaTweets
Posted: 4th, February 2014 | In: Fashion, Strange But True | Comment
These 3D Printed Nail Sets Are Fantastically Cool
NEW York City-based designers Sarah C. Awad and Dhemerae Ford of the Laser Girls are using technology for the awesome by kicking out 3D printed nail art.
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Posted: 30th, January 2014 | In: Fashion, Technology | Comment
The Cupid Bra Only Unhooks When True Love Is Detected
WHEN do you know if it’s true love? Japanese lingerie manufacturer Ravijou has taken the guesswork out of foreplay by inventing a bra clasp that only unhooks when “true love” is detected. If that significant other is only after a quick fumble or your valuables, the clasp stays closed.
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Posted: 25th, January 2014 | In: Fashion, Technology | Comment
Kobe Bryant’s Bid To Become Basketball’s Bobby Charlton
FANTASTIC haircut news: the bill to cut Kobe Bryan’s hair for a Nike shoot ran to $860.
This is Kobe Bryant:
No. That’s him on the right.
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Bugs Money: Thom Browne’s Fall-Winter Collection 2014-2015
MEN’S fashion is a great sauce of chuckling. Get a load of American fashion designer Thom Browne’s men’s Fall-Winter 2014-2015 fashion collection, presented Sunday, Jan. 19, 2014 in Paris.
He should have called the collection Bug Money or Mugs Money:
Norway’s Curling Team Are Early Leaders In Olympics Fashion Stakes With Their ‘Life-Changing’ Trousers
NORWAY’S Olympic curling team is in fine fettle for the upcoming games in Sochi.
Member of Norway’s Men’s Olympic Curling Team from left Thomas Ulsrud, Torgor Nergard, Christoffer Svae, and Havard Vad Petersson wear their new Sochi 2014 suits as they pose for a photographer in New York Tuesday Jan. 21, 2014. (AP Photo)
The Norwegians have form:
Norway’s Martin Sesaker, left, and his teammate Stine Haalien work on the stone while playing against Estonia during a mixed team curling event at the first winter Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck, Austria, Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2012. (AP Photo/Kerstin Joensson)
The designer is Christoffer Svae, who tells the AP that he asked a company called Loudmouth to jazz up the team’s kit:
“It’s definitely been life-changing for us,” Svae told the AP. “Not so much in the everyday but when we travel around the world for curling, it doesn’t always matter if we do well or not, people still think that we win stuff because we are always in the media.”
“I don’t think you’ll see a lot of the other teams do the same that we did,” Svae added, “they feel it’s our thing.”
If you look closely at the new kit, you can see a boy in tricycle riding up the zigzags.
Norway’s skip Torger Nergard throws his rock as first Havard Vad Petersson, left, and second Christoffer Svae sweep during a match against Sweden, at the Curling World Championships, in Cortina D’Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, April 4, 2010. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)
This photo made March 21, 2010, shows Norway’s skip Linn Githmark, center, during an evening draw against Canada in Swift Current, Sask. There was a large package waiting for Norway when the team arrived in Swift Current, Sask., for the women’s world curling championship. Out of the box came even louder versions of the loud pants their male counterparts popularized at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver last month.(AP Photo/The Canadian Press/HO, Michael Burns)
Norway’s skip Torger Nergard releases a stone on his way to win a semifinal match against Scotland, at the Curling World Championships, in Cortina D’Ampezzo, Italy, Saturday, April 10, 2010. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)
Norway’s Christoffer Svae, left, and Torger Nergaard, sweep a stone delivered by Haavard Vad Petersson, top, in a win over China in men’s curling at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, Friday, Feb. 19, 2010. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Victoria’s Secret: What A Difference 30 Years Makes
CAN YOU GUESS which Victoria’s Secret models come from 1984 and which are from recent catalogs? I’ll give you a hint: the ones from 1984 resemble actual human females.
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Posted: 31st, December 2013 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
