At first the only one I was going to stick up here was photo number 15, the one with the bloke holding his glasses in his mouth, because I just liked it. But then, I thought, some of these others are not too bad as well, and one photo led to another … and:
All photoed by me in the space of less than one hour, outside Westminster Abbey.
I love the old little cameras, now all gobbled up by the Mighty Mobile. But most of all I love how much fun we were all having, them photoing and me photoing them photoing.
Also: lots of maps. Also now swallowed up by the Mighty Mobile.
Something struck me looking at these pictures. Despite being 15 years old the only thing that dates them in my eyes are the cameras and maps. If the pictures had been from 50’s, 60’s, 70’s or 80’s I think I’d have been able to date them from the clothes. Since then not so much. Has Western casual fashion approached some kind of optimal state and further cultural evolution of it plateaued?
I have on occasion wondered about what makes old things look old. It’s just that something, anything, new came along. Alastair is right, only the cameras that would now be phones look old.
Could it be that when you reach a certain age, you stop registering the subtleties of fashion and fashion changes, rather as all pop music all sounds alike to oldies no matter from what recent decade it’s from? Actually, I agree that casual fashions are not changing. But maybe a young person would see changes that we olders might miss. Just a thought.
But then again, Rob is not actually that old. And Alastair is comfortably younger than me.
I think I would still recognise roughly which decade music is from for quite a few genres. But then I am very interested in music and not at all interested in clothes. Having said that I think the differences in clothing styles between 50’s, 60’s, 70’s and 80’s are very stark. And not just in young people’s clothing but also for example business suits and ties. So you may be right that youngsters could spot subtle differences that I miss but do they think 90’s, 00’s, 10’s are as different as I think those earlier decades were? I’ll have to ask my son…
Alastair
I’d be very interested in hearing any answer your son can supply. I suspect he may agree with you.
I further suspect the changes in clothing style may have quite deep roots in the economy, which I believe has got a lot freer, in the sense that many more people can afford to be unemployed for a while than used to be the case. This means that if someone is doing something vital in his work place, and if he knows it, he can dress as he feels inclined, far more than used to be the case. In same way, he doesn’t have to put up nearly so much with being bullied by his boss. On the contrary, his boss now has to go on a course to learn how not to be a bully.
My Designated Best Friend (you surely know who I mean) earns her living by teaching people in authority to exercise their authority better. To put it bluntly, she teaches them good manners.
Who knew a bunch of photoer photos would provoke such thoughts.