Random Goodness: Shirts, Skirts, and Assorted Miscellany - Part 1

As you know, I love to pick out the odd photo from catalogs, magazines, and ads of the 70s have some good natured fun with it.  However, there a number of pics from that era that were, well, rather normal but still worth taking a look see.  That's why I started this new category "Random Goodness" to highlight these pics  Also, I wanted something with more positive energy to offset the rather negative vibe of the "Random Weirdness" (1) category.

And what can generate more positive energy than shirts, skirts, and assorted miscellany! (and yes I know that they are technically blouses, not shirts, but hey, that's doesn't fit with the alliteration).

Wow, that's a good way to start off this series.  I don't know how random it is, but Kathy and friends are certainly bringing the goodness!

Kay and Karen get in on the act in some really snazzy shirts and skirts.  They even come with matching sweaters!

Yep, "Fresh and Flippy", that's what I think about when I think of skirts, yeah right.  I love the "puffy shirt" look on Kay.  Arrrr, matey!

You know, the more I look at this pic, the more it looks like it was taken in a parking lot?  I know Aldens was at the low end of the hierarchy of mail order catalogs, but still.

"Where are the shirts or the skirts here?" you ask.  Well, the acrylic rib-knit pullovers fall into "assorted miscellany".  The cool hat that Kathy is wearing is pretty miscellaneous also.  Is she trying to join a motorcycle gang or what?

Something to the right of these ladies must be VERY interesting because they are all looking over there in unison.  The ascot on the lady on the left is a nice, if miscellaneous, touch!

Let's end the first post in this category with a really nice pic of Kathy and Kay.  You gotta love the weird little collars on Kay's shirt.  And yes, Kay is technically not wearing a skirt, but instead some sort of funky pantsuit that looks like a skirt - a little bit of miscellany, and a little bit randomly weird.  Perhaps, this category should instead be called "Random Weirdness Lite".


footnotes:

(1) Don't worry, the Random Weirdness category isn't going away.  Oh no, no, no!  There is plenty of randomly weird stuff yet to explore!

Random Weirdness: Wig Out!

Well, ya'll probably knew this post was coming sooner or later.  Based on some of my previous comments, you probably know that I'm not all that big of a fan of wigs, but they were very popular back in the 70s. And as a historical blogger I am compelled to cover all the offerings of the 70s catalogs.  Sooooo, here we go!

"Wigs that go to your Head".  Hey I think it should be "Wigs that go ON your Head".  Get your prepositions straight will ya!! I guess my problem with wigs is this: why? (1)  I mean Kathy and Dottie still look cute here and all that, but, again I ask: Why?  After all, they were super good looking in their own hair, why mess with that?

Okay this is weirding me out now.  100% human hair!! and down in the lower right, we have Kathy getting ready to put on a wig.  It looks like torture to me!

Instead of natural hair, you could have gone with the all synthetic wigs from Sears.  They even brag about how they hold their shape no matter what.  Wow, isn't modern chemistry amazing!  However, shouldn't they be called "The Uncrushables"?

The catalogs often promoted their wigs with well known personalities.  Here Alrene Dahl lends her signature to a Sears line of wigs.  She was a movie star in the 1950s, who, ah hem, reportedly had an interesting personal life.  Perhaps they were trying channel that with the wigs.  You know, put on a wig and voila!, you can live vicariously as a movie star!

So enough with putting them on, how did these wigs work out for some of our models?

All three models in wigs!  Maybe the catalogs would put a model in wigs so that they could have the one person model different looks - sort of two different models for the price of one?  Or maybe, putting on wigs was a fun way of pretending to be someone else.  Sort of like what kids do now with tattoos, but a lot less permanent.

Once again, we have three of our models in wigs.   They kind of look like Cold War era spies or something, but I don't think they are fooling anyone here.  They are way too good looking to go incognito!

Wigs really could change the way a gal looked.  For example....

Here we have Kathy as a both a brunette and a blond.  You can really see the difference.  It is like an entirely different woman!  Why would a gal want to do that?  Ohhh, now I get it, never mind...

So did the wigs always work out?

Uhhh, no.


footnotes:

(1) Please understand that I completely understand wearing wigs due to medical conditions.  That is not what I'm talking about here.