ALT-1 Great Gifts for People with an Interest in the 1970s
The nineteen seventies were a time of huge change. Building on the 60s, fashion, music, popular culture, and technology diversified. The bright colours and optimism of the 1970s appeal both to the young and those who remember their salad days with fondness. The optimism of the 60s and the fascination with the moon landing in 1969 led to a greater interest in science, technology, and space. Changes in social attitudes that began in the 1960s accelerated in the 70s, reflecting the growing pace of technological change epitomizing the decade.
Many articles would make a splendid gift for someone with an interest in the 1970s. You must first ascertain exactly what it is about the 1970s that piques your friend or relative’s interest; whether it is music, fashion, culture, films, books collectables and whether their interest is because they lived through the decade or simply have a historical interest. This will determine your choice of gift.
Music provides a good opportunity to buy or make a present. Music in the 70s, was much more diverse than it had been in the sixties, where in the 60s there was mostly just pop but the 1970s saw different types of music emerging from pop, to reggae, folk rock, psychedelic rock, and punk rock.
Icons from the sixties such as Elvis Presley, Cliff Richards, and The Rolling Stones were still popular but there were different types of pop music emerging by artists and groups such as Bread, The Carpenters, Olivia Newton John, Rod Stewart, Queen, Aswad, and the Cimarons. You could buy or make a disc of music from the time, or, if the intended recipient of your gift has a working turntable or record player, a record or album. A record was a large disc, around 12 inches in diameter, made from black vinyl with a hole in the middle. You can buy records at thrift, charity or second hand stores, or at your local car boot sale, or from a specialist record dealer, be sure to check the record’s playing surface before you purchase as scratches render a record unplayable.
The seventies was the disco decade (club), discothèques were where teenagers and young people gathered to dance and listen to music. They were bright, cheerful places with glitter balls and coloured flashing lights. The fashions of the time of the time reflect this. The 1970s saw fashions in clothing, furniture, and house wares change and diversify. Bright colours and brown were the colours of the decade and many people had brown and orange rooms in their houses. Bright colours were not just on people’s walls, everything was brightly coloured and/or floral glassware, pottery, clothes and posters. You could buy a retro-item second hand from charity, thrift or second hand stores, your local car boot sale, auction house or specialist dealer or from a specialist on line dealer. There are many specialist on line dealers inseventies memorabilia. You can even buy seventies style item new, some things such as lava lamps and seventies style glassware are now in fashion and being made again.
Platform shoes, smock dresses maxi dresses floral bright colours skinhead clothes, such as tonic suits and Ben Sherman shirts, tie dyed tee-shirts, crochet tank tops were all a feature of seventies fashions. You can buy these items second hand at the above outlets, or at specialist vintage clothing dealers or on line. Crochet was very popular in the 70s if you can crochet, you could crochet a tank top, a short sleeveless pullover, usually striped but always bright. Crochet shawls accompanied the floral maxi dresses that girls wore, as they tottered about on platform shoes. You can even buyseventies platform shoeson line.
People’s social attitudes had begun to change during the 1960’s and this continued in the 1970s. In Britain, the Equal Pay Act 1970 and the Sex Equality Act began to change women’s lives. The first British conference of the Women’s Liberation Movement took place in Oxford in 1970. Germaine Greer’s “The Female Eunuch” published 1970 was a famous book of the time and caused problems in many households with husbands destroying their wives’ copies.
Books would make a great gift for anyone interested in the 1970’s, whether their interest is piqued by nostalgia, fondness, interest or from the point of view of social history. Erich Segal’s “Love Story”, Alex Haley’s “Roots” and Carl Bernstein’s “All the President’s men” were bestsellers in the 70’s. These books illustrate in different ways how people’s attitudes were changing as well as being very good reads.
In Britain, pounds, shillings and pence changed into decimal currency on the 15th February 1971. A set of decimal coins, bearing the 1971 date, could make an excellent gift.
As more people were able to afford a television, television became more popular in the seventies. A DVD of a favourite television programme or series could make your 70s nut very happy. People went to the cinema far more often in the 1970s than they do now and films such as “Grease” and “Saturday Night Fever” played to packed houses of teenagers. “Clockwork Orange” “Star Wars” and “The Exorcist” are other classic 1970’s films. A DVD of a 1970s film would make a great gift for a film buff. Comics and posters were very popular in the 1970’s and these are available on line.Retro sweets or candiesmight please someone with a sweet tooth and evoke happy memories.
Many gifts would make a splendid and appreciated gift for anyone interested in the 1970s. An internet search would yield more suggestions and ideas than space here allows. A trip to the local library and a trawl through the newspaper archives, looking at the quality newspapers would give you more information about the time and the features, classified advertisements, book and film reviews would give you more ideas for great gifts to buy for someone, interested in the amazing decade that was the 1970s.
