Ultra Swank - Retro Adventures

Inspiration

Vintage Halloween Costumes from the 1950s to the 1970s

Ah, Halloween. The streets fill with children in trendy, creepy, and cute costumes all hot in pursuit of the best candy. This year, households can expect the classics: some werewolves, witches, and wizards. As well as culturally hip get-ups parents with some free time conjured up (take a shot for every Hogwarts student, minion, Trump and creepy nun costume). This holiday also brings with it...

Lotus Esprit – The Quintessential 1970s Supercar

In the mid-1970s, English automaker Lotus replaced the Europa, a boxy, mid-engined pocket-racer for driving enthusiasts, with a now-classic wedge design, and called it the Esprit. With sharp ‘folded paper’ lines and flat surfaces courtesy of legendary designer Giorgetto Guigiaro, the outrageously low and wide Esprit looked like nothing before it – and nothing since. It represented Lotus’s attempt to step into the higher-end exotic...

The Challenge of a Vintage Lifestyle in a Twenty First Century

When it comes to living an authentic vintage lifestyle nowadays, I believe it’s a lot harder than when I first started hanging out in the Rockabilly scene in the late eighties. Back then it was easy to avoid technology, it was easier to be separate from the mainstream society. Back then if a buddy pulled out a cell phone or admitted to us that he...

What Kind of Man is a Lounge Lothario

Today’s “me, me, me society” has led to a different type of man, a man who stands for little. A man who has a lot of unhealthy personal habits and very often is unattractive to women because of these self centered habits. Koop Kooper is a traditional man who is self confident and clear in his intentions in both love life, career and friendships. Today...

Back To The Bricks with Flint Foto Factory

Every Mid-August for the past five years, Joe Dennis, creator of Flint Foto Factory, leaves his day job and his Chicago home to enjoy the week long Back To The Bricks Festival in Flint, Michigan, his hometown. Flint is best known as the prototype for the rise and fall of the American auto industry and is often cited as an example of the economic downward...

Merry Retro Christmas to You All

The Holiday season is upon us, so it is time to pull out all those swanky and kitschy retro christmas advertisements from the past! These hand drawn illustrations are so awesome. Produced in mid century America they perfectly depicts the happy-go-lucky mentality of those decades. Which one do you like the best? From all of us, to all of you – Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah...

Christmas with Barbie 1964 to 1968
Written by Patricia Greenwood in Inspiration

Christmas with Barbie 1964 to 1968

I was five years old when my mom showed me an advertisement for Mattel’s Barbie doll wearing that iconic black and white bathing suit, which had already been out since the late 50s. It was my first memorable exposure and I was immediately taken in by the grown up looking doll. That Christmas I received my first “Barbie,” though I’m pretty sure she was a...

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