I have written previously about how people today can look exactly the same fashion-wise as people who grew up in the 1970s. See my article on cool grannies. I wrote
The photo above was taken in 1968, when this woman was 22. She was thus born in 1946. Even though this photo was taken 54 years ago, this woman could walk out of the photograph in the present day, and fit in perfectly. The hairstyle, the fashion, and even the car, would still be cool.
But if you work backwards, this woman's grandmother would have been born in about 1900 and would have dressed and done her hair completely differently. She would not have been allowed to show her ankles or worked (if she was not working class), or gone out without a chaperone. She would not have had a teenage life, but rather gone from being a child straight to being a mini adult. If a family member died she may have gone into full mourning (wearing only black) to half mourning (wearing lilac and grey), like her parents.
That thought cropped up again a few days ago, when I saw this photograph from the same era when someone was trying to find a similar short-suit. The woman's shoes, romper, and t shirt could have been bought yesterday.
And you sometimes see things like this on social media.
I got to wondering why the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s had such defined cultural trends in music and fashion, but these days things have moved beyond a singular style or anything groundbreaking. Instead, these old styles seem to be recycled in a way that never happened before.
I found a very interesting article in the New York Times by Jason Farago. It was called
I read another analysis in Medium magazine.
And going backwards I saw this 2011 Vanity Fair article by Kurt Andersen
Do you agree that each decade or generation does not have the same defined cultural trends as before?
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