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Tartan

No description necessary. What ever happened to Les, Eric, Alan, Woody, and the other one? (1975). These guys really put the Tartan pattern back on the map, as this Scottish super group of the Bay City Rollers (named after an American town) ,gave the Scottish tartan a worldwide hike.

No need to worry about which clan you belonged to, all you had to do is wear those big thick red checked tartan trousers to school. Of course, it was absolutely compulsory to have them flared, and to be made of the thickest material possible.

The girls would go one further. Not only did they wear tartan miniskirts or even dirt collecting tartan maxi skirts, they also wore tartan tops and waistcoats in homage to the boy band of the 1970s. Tartan scarves tied round your wrist showed you were a real Rollers fan too.

The true tartan designs were largely ignored, as anything that looked like it a tartan pattern was mass-produced and sent across the UK and the World.

Don’t forget that the group was actually a huge hit in the U.S. too, so tartan watchstraps, tartan bands and yes, even tartan shoes were making the kids of the 1970s look like Mel Gibson in Braveheart times a million.

By the late 1970s, The Bay City Rollers had more or less sunk without trace and were to spend the next 30 years trying to get paid for their record sales – a figure well into the millions.
However, tartan made another comeback, only this time it was as part of the punk uniform so lacked the mainstream appeal of the earlier craze.

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70s Fashion

I loved the fashions of the seventies… why you ask? Was it the colours of the fabrics? No? Or maybe it was the cool flowing styles? Maybe. Or possibly it was that I am a little restricted in the height department and that those platform shoes were a heaven sent present from the Fashion Gods. More...

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