Camel, fawn, buff, stone, mocha – there are numerous methods to disguise the color brown, however nobody’s fooling me. Gown it up any method you want – and I like you, Giorgio Armani, Max Mara, Marni and the remainder on your world-class brownsmanship – however, to me, it is going to all the time be the color that ruined my adolescence. I grew up within the Seventies, the dun-coloured decade, and the sartorial scars run deep.
A lot of the injury was executed in 1975, within the communal altering rooms at Richard Outlets. On Saturday afternoons, the air can be thick with desperation and a noxious cocktail of Charlie and Tramp eau de parfum liberally utilized in Woolworths, as my pals and I plotted how finest to ensnare boys on the youth membership disco. Issues have been feral and unenlightened in my Birmingham suburb, and success trusted one factor. Or relatively two. Breasts – and I didn’t have any. With little else to supply – I had the unsuitable hair, I used to be too tall, my pores and skin was cratered with spots – it was left to garments to do the heavy-lifting on my behalf… and brown let me down badly.
Wanting again on photographic proof of the period – scowling, gawky me in an acrylic striped tank high and flappy-collared floral shirt, all in shades of tan, rust and mustard, with eyebrows plucked to close oblivion – it’s clear that the Seventies have been ravaged by an ideal storm of ugly colors, unhealthy styling and horrendous element. Partly in charge was the rise in reputation of the artificial materials that crammed the rails at our favorite outlets, Van Allan, Chelsea Woman and C&A. Crimplene, Nylon, Terylene and a static-heavy swathe of Poly-mixes might have made for straightforward laundering, however in consequence, nuances of color and texture have been summarily eradicated. Brown as a fascinating color was, actually, frolicked to dry.
Nonetheless, is it any shock the UK was a predominantly brown-clothed nation, when, in reality, the entire temper of the nation was distinctly drab? The miners’ strike, energy cuts, winters of discontent, three-day weeks, soiled protests: little surprise the offended, dissatisfied Seventies produced a palette not often encountered exterior the partitions of a sewage recycling facility.
However shouldn’t I’ve acquired over it by now? It’s not as if numerous attractive browns in dreamily pure fibres aren’t available. A part of me nearly longs for that stage of sartorial maturity that comes with a correct camel coat and a grown-up tan purse. Nonetheless, an insurmountable psychological block stays: brown shouldn’t be for me. I can’t have it in my life. It’s, maybe, karma for all of the wildly insulting issues I’ve mentioned about it over time that I now reside within the countryside, just about surrounded by brown. To say my antipathy in the direction of the color is triggered every day isn’t any exaggeration. Rural life is awash with waxed jackets, earthy corduroy, and don’t get me began on tweed. To me, Tweed will all the time be the Lenthéric scent worn by my tyrannical and sadistic home science trainer again in 1976. Like my protracted brown-aversion, the whiff of it rising above the scent of burnt sausage rolls was insistent, all-pervading and had a behavior of lingering…
Judy Rumbold is a contract author and journalist and new TNMA contributor.
Tempting browns for the Seventies-scarred:
