Things here have been a bit casual today, so here’s a quota photo to beef things up, of the I Just Like It sort:
This mysterious photo was photoed by me somewhere in the Centre Point Covent Garden sort of area of London, in May 2015. I don’t think I have ever done a blog posting about it before. I think that because I still don’t know what I could possibly have said about it, and I don’t know now either. What does it mean? He really wants to see what is in front of him, and what’s behind him, is all I can think of.
It looks like a rather old photo, from the sixties or some such antique time, and maybe rather famous. But, what do I know?
I like the L-plate. Riding that would take a bit of learning.
It is indeed a photo from the 60’s, of a member of the Mod subculture. Of his bike, Wikipedia says:
“Many mods drove motor scooters, usually Vespas or Lambrettas. Scooters were a practical and affordable form of transportation for 1960s teens, since until the early 1970s, public transport stopped relatively early in the night. For teens with low-paying jobs, scooters were cheaper and easier to park than cars, and they could be bought through newly-available hire purchase plans.”
“Mods also treated scooters as a fashion accessory. Italian scooters were preferred due to their clean-lined, curving shapes and gleaming chrome, with sales driven by close associations between dealerships and clubs, such as the Ace of Herts.”
“For young mods, Italian scooters were the ’embodiment of continental style and a way to escape the working-class row houses of their upbringing’. Mods customised their scooters by painting them in ‘two-tone and candyflake and overaccessorized [them] with luggage racks, crash bars, and scores of mirrors and fog lights’. Some mods added four, ten, or as many as 30 mirrors to their scooters. They often put their names on the small windscreen. They sometimes took their engine side panels and front bumpers to electroplating shops to get them covered in highly reflective chrome.”
Some evolutionary psychologists might suggest it is a form of peacock’s tail. The number of lights and mirrors indicates the owner has a reasonable amount of disposable cash, and as you say he demonstrates considerable physical skill in learning to ride it.
Ooh, it turns out the photo isn’t from the 60’s but from the early 80’s of a 17 year old emulating the Mod culture of two decades earlier. See https://vintagenewsdaily.com/17-year-old-school-leaver-showing-off-his-customized-vespa-scooter-which-has-34-mirrors-and-81-lights/