Lighters aren’t just for REO Speedwagon concerts
1January 17, 2008 by Colin
Indulge me here. When I was a kid, everyone smoked. Everywhere. Which meant that lighters and ashtrays were an everyday fact of life.
So common, in fact, that they were considered accessories to your home decor. There were ashtrays that looked remarkably like appetizer plates, or maybe highball glasses. Popular in my house were ceramic ashtrays from Mediterranean countries like Spain, Greece and Italy. As for lighters, they resembled hookahs, and others looked like cubist party favours.
In fact, lighters could be divided into the personal (whether a small Bic, a showoff Zippo, or a swanky Davidoff) and the communal – a larger piece that suggested careful design and a shared experience (like a big hunk of silver or brass sitting on the coffee table)
Sort of like the Braun lighters to the right. I found these in a Gizmodo post on the similarities between Apple’s design and the work of Dieter Rams for Braun – in the 60s.
[tags] cigarettes, lighters, ashtrays, home decor [/tags]
Have you heard stories from the old-school civil servants of the days when everyone had big honkin’ ashtrays on their desks?
I’ve also heard stories of David Dodge’s pipe smoke wafting up into Ministers Offices of yesteryear.