A 16 Year Old Sid Vicious Going to a David Bowie Concert at Earls Court, London, 1973

A young John Ritchie (he was yet to become a Sex Pistol in the shape of Sid Vicious) was pictured on his way to a David Bowie concert in London, 1973. He certainly knew how to play-up to the camera, and proudly displaying his Bowie T-shirt.

Following UK dates at the start of the year, the Ziggy Stardust Tour revisited the USA in February and Japan for the first time in April 1973. Returning to the UK, the fourth leg of the tour had an auspicious opening at London’s Earls Court on May 12.

Speaking of that last show at Hammersmith, a local lad (another yet to be Sex Pistol), Steve Jones, helped himself to some of Bowie’s equipment. So, it could be argued that Bowie not only influenced the look of the fledgling band, but also unwittingly contributed to the Sex Pistols’ sound too.

Cool Photos Show Fashion Styles of Young Ladies in the 1950s

Fashion in the 1950s was exciting and diverse. There were new colors, fresh silhouettes, and different style options for different personalities. Today, the iconic decade is still heavily referenced in the fashion world. It is especially beloved for its chic retro style and playful looks, including those of the pin-up and rockabilly subcultures.

Key designs for the decade included dresses with cinched waists, pencil skirts, poodle skirts, gingham and polka dot garments, cropped sweaters and cardigans, and much more. The key shape for the decade was a feminine, exaggerated hourglass silhouette.

Additionally, as this decade saw the birth of the teenage culture, a distinction between youth fashion and more mature styles also developed. These cool photos from Vintage Cars & People that show fashion styles of young ladies in the 1950s.

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Photos of Old English Costumes Dating From ca. 1450 Through the 1870s

Talbot Hughes (1869–1942) was a British painter (of genre, history and landscape), a collector of historical costumes and miniature portraits, and writer on fine art and costume design. He amassed a collection of over 750 historical costumes and accessories, dating from ca. 1450 through the 1870s, which he used as studio props.

In 1910 he sold a small collection of bags to the Victoria and Albert Museum and also donated individual items, including an 1820s frock coat. In 1913, when Hughes decided to put the rest of his collection up for sale, he was offered £5,000 by an American department store who wished to donate it to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Rather than send his collection abroad, Hughes instead sold it to the department store Harrods in London for £2,500, where it was displayed for three weeks to advertise the store’s own range of women’s contemporary fashions.

After this period, Harrods transferred the collection by donation to the Victoria & Albert Museum, the result of negotiations by the then Director of the V&A, Cecil Harcourt Smith. The collection is still kept at the V&A. Talbot Hughes continued to donate individual items to the Museum up until 1931.

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Flashback to the Glory Days of American Malls in the 1980s

In the winter of 1989, 20-year-old photographer Michael Galinsky began driving across the country to document the seismic change in shopping malls, which at the time were central to American culture. They represented suburban consumerism in its most basic form and provided a place for families and teens to shop and socialize.

These pictures lay forgotten until Galinsky revisited his work in 2010. Initially posted online, the interest in his photos suddenly exploded. After a successful Kickstarter campaign, Galinsky’s selected work was published in the book Malls Across America by the renowned publisher Steidl in 2013.

In 2018, Galinsky decided to revisit his archive once more, aware that there was still a strong appetite for the project. “That book is now very expensive, and it didn’t include all the work by any means. So this summer I did a Kickstarter to raise funds to print an entirely new book with no repeat images.” Galinsky described his book The Decline of Mall Civilization. “It’s a very different book in that it is almost entirely double page spreads where the pictures play off of each other. I’m so happy that people keep finding meaning in the work. (and themselves!)”

Take a look back at the glory days of shopping malls and the style of shoppers that defined a generation through these 35 fascinating color pictures taken by Galinsky in 1989:

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40 Incredibly Colorized Photos of the 1903 Winter Palace Costume Ball

The 1903 ball in the Winter Palace was a luxurious ball during the reign of the Emperor Nicholas II of Russia. It was held in the Winter Palace, Saint Petersburg, in two stages, on February 11 and 13. All the visitors were in bejeweled 17th-century style costumes, made from designs by the artist Sergey Solomko, in collaboration with historical experts.

1903 costume ball in the Winter Palace

The entire Imperial family posed in rich 17th-century costumes, Tsar Nicholas as Alexis, the Tsaritsa Alexandra as Maria Miloslavskaya, in the Hermitage Theatre, many wearing priceless original items brought specially from the Kremlin, for what was to be their final photograph together.

These amazing photos are colorized by klimbims that show participants of the 1903 costume ball in the Winter Palace.

Alexandra Feodorovna, Costume Ball 1903

Anna Taneeva (Vyrubova) with sister, Costume Ball 1903

Cornette Kolioubakine, Costume Ball 1903

Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna of Russia, Costume Ball 1903.

Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna of Russia, Costume Ball 1903

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18 Photographs of Peggy Guggenheim Wearing Her Iconic “Butterfly” Sunglasses in Venice in the 1950s and 1960s

A woman wearing extravagant sunglasses. She sits on a gondola in a Venetian canal. She’s surrounded by dogs. She looks straight at the camera. It’s Marguerite “Peggy” Guggenheim, of course. A character immediately recognizable for fashion and art lovers alike.

Peggy Guggenheim (1898–1979) was a American art collector and friend to the surrealists who chose to wear her butterfly sunglasses like a badge of honor. Designed by Edward Melcarth, her butterfly style glasses were a work of art–a vision of power; inspiring, shocking, and leaving others in complete awe.

In 1994 Safilo paid homage to this iconic design by producing a remake of these imaginative frames on sale at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice. Twenty years later, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the brand, the model was proposed again with bright blue acetate lenses and caramel profiles. Today you can find a new version of this collector's item: the structure is cream-colored, in perfect harmony with the havana profiles.

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Cast-Off Shoes Make Tires for “Rough Rider” Bicycle, 1931

If you don’t know what to do with your old shoes, here’s a suggestion—make bike wheels out of them. No less a unique stunt has been performed by Marie Glory, a well-known Parisian bicycling enthusiast, as the photo shows. The regular wheel has been dispensed with altogether, and the “shoe wheel” substituted.

Discarded shoes fitted on wooden spokes form wheel rims of this bike, made by Marie Glory. 

Each shoe is fitted over a form, which is in turn attached to the ends of a spoke, of which there are six on each wheel. Although these bike wheels are the last word in novelty, it cannot be said that they are the last word in comfortable riding. The inventor, however, enjoys the sport.

Vintage Portraits of Male Lifeguards of the 1920s

Starting in the 1800’s, bathing, now known as swimming, became a popular recreational activity in the United States. Entrepreneurs saw a niche and built resorts in places like Atlantic City and New Jersey, to attract humans from inland metropolitan areas to escape the summer heat. As water activity increased, so did the incidence of drowning. By the early 19th century as many as 9,000 humans drowned each year in the United States.

Initially these eager businessmen were installing lifelines. However, lifelines proved inadequate because struggling swimmers were not able to grasp ahold of them once they entered into what would become known as the “Drowning Chain”. Duke Kahanamoku, one of Hawaii’s first original watermen, introduced the rescue board between 1910 and 1915, and Captain Harry Sheffield of South Africa is credited with developing the first rescue float . Some communities assigned police officers to perform water rescues, but this diverted resources from law enforcement. Eventually, municipalities began to hire men and women trained specifically for water rescue. They were deemed “lifeguards.”

Lifeguards not being presence at all public bathing areas led the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) to develop a volunteer National Lifesaving Service in 1912. In 1914, Commodore Wilbert E. Longfellow established the American Red Cross Lifesaving, which trained swimmers throughout the United States in lifesaving and resuscitation, then organized them into volunteer corps, and encouraged them to accept responsibility for supervision of bathing activities in their communities.

In the beginning the lifeguard training programs primarily emphasized personal water safety: how to prevent drownings and protect oneself in emergencies. Nonswimming rescue methods, such as throwing a rope or a floating object to the human in the water, were encouraged. Lifeguards considered swimming rescues a last resort due to the hazard presented by a panicked swimmer in the water.

However, soon swimming rescues were unavoidable for professional beach lifeguards in the United States. Special tools, such as the landline and the dory, were developed to assist in swimming rescues. Over time, improved lifesaving devices were created by beach lifeguards in the United States. These include the rescue buoy, the rescue tube, and the rescue board which are commonly used around the world at beaches, pools, and water parks. Today, many beach lifeguards use powerboats and personal watercraft to assist them in reaching off-shore swimmers in distress quickly and use scuba equipment for deep water rescues.

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35 Fabulous Photos of Victorian Couples on Their Wedding Days

Brides in the 19th century did not wear white for their weddings for most of the century—the color was too expensive and impractical without modern bleaching techniques. Instead, colors like purple, dark blue, brown, red, and gold were popular. Brides would often wear their Sunday best, as having a separate dress to wear for just one occasion was extremely impractical in a world without the mass-production of textiles we have today.

Towards the very end of the century, white dresses became more popular with the revolution in production techniques, however many of these dresses would be dyed darker colors by the brides after their wedding day and reused. Grooms would wear their best clothes.

Here below is a set of fabulous photos that shows Victorian couples on their wedding days.

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30 Cool Photos Defined Fashion Styles of Young Women in the 1970s

The 1970s began with a continuation of the hippie look from the 1960s, giving a distinct ethnic flavor.

Popular early 1970s fashions for women included Tie dye shirts, Mexican ‘peasant’ blouses, folk-embroidered Hungarian blouses, ponchos, capes, and military surplus clothing. Bottom attire for women during this time included bell-bottoms, gauchos, frayed jeans, midi skirts, and ankle-length maxi dresses. Hippie clothing during this time was made in extremely bright colors, as well as Indian patterns, Native American patterns, and floral patterns.

By the mid-1970s, the hippie look had completely disappeared, although casual looks continued. In the mid-1970s women wore sweaters, T-shirts, cardigans, kimono, graphic T-shirts and sweaters, jeans, khakis, gauchos, workmen’s clothes, and vintage clothing. The disco music genre spawned its own fashion craze in the mid- to late 1970s. Disco clothes worn by women included tube tops, sequined halterneck shirts, blazers, spandex short shorts, loose pants, form-fitting spandex pants, maxi skirts and dresses with long thigh slits, jersey wrap dresses, ball gowns, and evening gowns.

Women’s fashions in the late 1970s included cowl-neck shirts and sweaters, pantsuits, leisure suits, tracksuits, sundresses worn with tight T-shirts, strapless tops, lower-cut shirts, cardigans, velour shirts, tunics, robes, crop tops, tube tops, embroidered vests and jeans, knee-length skirts, loose satin pants, designer jeans, culottes, daisy dukes, and tennis shorts. This continued into the 1980s.

These cool photos were found by Steven Martin that show what fashion styles of young women looked like in the 1970s.

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Model Wearing Slit Sunglasses With Message, 1968

Nikki, with the expressive eyes, March 29, 1968.

(Photos by Doreen Spooner)