The Decade that Taste Forgot

I was in the eighth grade in 1970, and a graduate student at UT Austin by 1979. In that pivotal 10 years, I witnessed the nadir of American taste. The 1970's was a harvest gold, avocado green, polyester, pimped out period where, for some reason, everything became truly tasteless. I do have a theory about 1970's tackiness. The 1960's brought us genuine war protest, and angst against the establishment. People became hippies or wore faded jeans and peace signs as a symbol of protest. The 1970's corporate execs took this impulse and tried to commercialize it. Thus the faded jeans worn at Woodstock morphed into the hideously laughable prewashed Britannia jeans made entirely of denim patches. (I must confess to having these, and wearing them in 1976). Almost every human endeavor of that decade resulted in insane, inane tackiness. I'll list some exceptions at the bottom, but they are not enough to ease these horrible 70's flashbacks. Lets look at the 70's in just 3 areas:

Cars - At the end of the 60's, cars were arguably at their best. The '69 model year was the greatest: the Mustang, the Camaro, El Dorado, Riviera, Ford Thunderbird - all beautiful automotive sculpture. And then for reasons unknown, the 70s auto execs decided that everyone needed a pimp mobile. Some 1970's car had these deluxe features: padded landau roof, opera windows, faux Rolls Royce grille, and a coat of arms on your hide-away headlamps. Even less luxe models had extremely thick chrome and vinyl cladding, harking back to the 50's. Rich Corinthian leather was offered on the Chrysler Cordoba. My coworker had a 1978 Bonneville with red, velour tufted pillow seating. It was like a bordello on wheels. These cars, like latter day Elvis, were self parody.

Architecture - The decade of the 60's was in some ways a culmination of modern architectural trends. The 70's, on the other hand, brought us an endless barrage of me-too buildings in brown brick with polaroid glass windows. Folded paper architecture at its dullest. Pebble conglomerate prefab buildings (now seen only in industrial parks) were offered up as legitimate office space. Tacky, poor quality, stick-built apartment complexes sprang up everywhere. These fake stucco mediocrities and faux Spanish villas are still trashing up our cityscapes today.

Clothes and hair - Where to begin? The 70s showed the power of trends - the moniker of "cool" was more important than what you saw in the full-length mirror with your own eyes. We were wearing leisure suits, disco shirts, gold chains, Levis movin' on jeans, platform shoes, and shapeless frizzy hair. Where were the fashion police when they were most needed?

By the end of the decade, the wackiness started to abate. Hard to say what happened to turn it all around. "The Preppy Handbook" came out circa 1980, touting the benefits of 100% cotton shirts. The Reagans came into office, and Nancy set a more tasteful tone (Designer gowns, Chippendale chairs) at a national level. Or maybe, just maybe, a few people actually looked in the mirror and saw that the Emperor was wearing purple hip-huggers.

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As I promised, some good things from the 70's (leaving some things out, I'm sure):
Mary Tyler Moore, All in the Family, Elton John, Nixon resigning, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Sonny and Cher Show, David Bowie, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Saturday Night Live. (Post a comment if I left something out, or you disagree with a 'good' designation). I know there was more that was good).