Era Immersion Living

[Gingerella72]

Many here at the lounge completely immerse themselves in the golden era in every aspect of their life, from housing, clothing, entertainment, cooking, etc. It never occurred to me that some people may do the same thing with older eras. I came across this article about a couple who live a completely Victorian life, and the reaction it generates from others:

http://www.vox.com/2015/9/9/9275611/victorian-era-life

It got me wondering if anyone here as ever heard of or known anyone who does this with an older era? Not reenactors, nor an experiment for a project, but simply because they enjoy the lifestyle?

Living life as if it were the golden era at least seems more practical in modern times, because you'd still have electricity, telephones, and even TV.....but it's hard for me to imagine someone living a pre-1900 lifestyle, long-term. I hope they at least have some concessions for modernity for emergencies - access to a phone nearby, or smoke alarms in the home.

 

[LizzieMaine]

A woman here in my town did this in the 1930s -- living her life entirely as though it were the 1870s. Her home was exactly as it had been in her father's time, her clothing never changed, and she refused to even install electricity or a telephone. She didn't live way out in the boonies, either -- her house was right in the dead center of town.

The kids around town considered her a witch.

Her house still exists and is preserved as a museum.

 

[Gingerella72]

Cool! Glad they turned the house into a museum instead of tearing it down, or remodeling it.

Now that I think about it, didn't the children's author Tasha Tudor live an 1840's life, except when she had to be involved with modern publishing requirements?

It's always fun to contemplate living that way, a "could I do it?" challenge like 1900 House or Frontier House (or 1940's House, for that matter). I think I could do it short term as an experiment, but not long term. I'd have to do a bastardized version of it, like have the house and the clothes, but keep electricity and central heat/air.

 

[Edward]

Between 1979 and his death in 1999, American Dennis Severs lived in a house in Spitalfields, East London, which he restored with each room representing a different time period, from 1724 to 1919. It was opened as a work of art to the public (still is), but he really did live in it like that. Can still be seen today (a colleague of mine's other half works there as a guide). Www.dennissevershouse.co.uk

Multiple era immersion living..

 

[Gingerella72]

That looks like an amazing experience Edward, if I ever make it across the pond it will be on my list of must-sees.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Cool! Glad they turned the house into a museum instead of tearing it down, or remodeling it.

Now that I think about it, didn't the children's author Tasha Tudor live an 1840's life, except when she had to be involved with modern publishing requirements?

It's always fun to contemplate living that way, a "could I do it?" challenge like 1900 House or Frontier House (or 1940's House, for that matter). I think I could do it short term as an experiment, but not long term. I'd have to do a bastardized version of it, like have the house and the clothes, but keep electricity and central heat/air.

My grandparents' house was basically a "1940s House" during the time I was growing up -- aside from a television set, everything else from the furniture to the plumbing and heating was as it had been when they moved in in 1945. I knew how light a kerosene stove before I knew how to ride a bike -- if you're raised around that kind of way of life it's not all that hard to imagine going back to it. Granted, they were only twenty years out of date when I first became aware of the world, but it still seemed like the "normal" way to do things.

 

[Stearmen]

A woman here in my town did this in the 1930s -- living her life entirely as though it were the 1870s. Her home was exactly as it had been in her father's time, her clothing never changed, and she refused to even install electricity or a telephone. She didn't live way out in the boonies, either -- her house was right in the dead center of town.

The kids around town considered her a witch.

Her house still exists and is preserved as a museum.

No telephone, that proves it, she was a witch! Kind of sad, how mean kids can be.

 

[Stearmen]

Between 1979 and his death in 1999, American Dennis Severs lived in a house in Spitalfields, East London, which he restored with each room representing a different time period, from 1724 to 1919. It was opened as a work of art to the public (still is), but he really did live in it like that. Can still be seen today (a colleague of mine's other half works there as a guide). Www.dennissevershouse.co.uk

Multiple era immersion living..

It's staggering to think of all the change in that 195 year span! The birth of my country, the entire reign of Queen Victoria, the light bulb, telephones, the automobile, mans first flight in a balloon, then the Write brothers. Unbelievable!

 

[AmateisGal]

What I find appalling about this couple's story is the absolute plethora of hate and condescension they get from people. I read on her blog (her name is Sarah) yesterday that she was at a lavender farm festival and was sitting talking to a gentleman when a woman came up and started to life her skirt. "I wanted to see if you were real!" the woman said. And when Sarah rightfully objected to being fondled, the woman stormed off and went and got an employee from the farm to go and confront Sarah. He essentially told her, "If someone wants to touch you, let them." !!! And this is *not* an isolated occurrence. Sarah has actually had to force herself to go out in public because of all the snark and hate she receives, but she does it because she doesn't want them to win - and good for her! I've been astonished at the vitriol thrown their way on Twitter and other sites that have posted her story.

People can be unbelievably cruel. I know that several members of the Lounge have endured this type of treatment, as well. It's just sad.

 

[Edward]

It's staggering to think of all the change in that 195 year span! The birth of my country, the entire reign of Queen Victoria, the light bulb, telephones, the automobile, mans first flight in a balloon, then the Write brothers. Unbelievable!

It would be interesting to pick out the generation within that with the most changes. It often seems to me that the priod from the mid seventies to now has seen more and more rapid change than any other, but that may just be because I lived through it. To someone on the ground in 1920-1940, say, it may have seemed equally so.

 

[LizzieMaine]

What I find appalling about this couple's story is the absolute plethora of hate and condescension they get from people. I read on her blog (her name is Sarah) yesterday that she was at a lavender farm festival and was sitting talking to a gentleman when a woman came up and started to life her skirt. "I wanted to see if you were real!" the woman said. And when Sarah rightfully objected to being fondled, the woman stormed off and went and got an employee from the farm to go and confront Sarah. He essentially told her, "If someone wants to touch you, let them." !!! And this is *not* an isolated occurrence. Sarah has actually had to force herself to go out in public because of all the snark and hate she receives, but she does it because she doesn't want them to win - and good for her! I've been astonished at the vitriol thrown their way on Twitter and other sites that have posted her story.

People can be unbelievably cruel. I know that several members of the Lounge have endured this type of treatment, as well. It's just sad.

I think a lot of people find the idea that people can live perfectly happily without all, or even most of, the consumption-driven baggage of the modern era to be very, very threatening to their own worldview. Once you've guzzled down the Boys' Kool-Aid, and declared that you "can't live without" this or that bit of techie gimcrackery, anyone who doesn't buy into it is basically demonstrating that you're wrong, and some people take that as an act of aggression. So they become very very defensive, and that defensiveness become aggressive: HAHAHAHA WHAT A HYPOCRITE YOU POSTED THIS ON THE INTERNET YOU FAKER LIVING IN YOUR LITTLE FANTASY WORLD HA HA HA YOU THINK YOU"RE SO VINTAGE HA HA ad infinitum.

Of course, having said that, I'll also say it's just as possible to be a twenty-first-century consumer-fetishist with "vintage stuff" as it is with modern stuff. It's not about the stuff you own, it's about what that stuff means to your life.

 

[LizzieMaine]

It would be interesting to pick out the generation within that with the most changes. It often seems to me that the priod from the mid seventies to now has seen more and more rapid change than any other, but that may just be because I lived through it. To someone on the ground in 1920-1940, say, it may have seemed equally so.

I think for someone born in 1875, before the telephone and the electric light, who was an adult when powered flight and automobiles became a reality, who was moving into middle age when broadcasting was invented, and who lived long enough to look into a glowing box in their living room and see a human being set foot on the moon, the course of the world over their lifetime must've seemed absolutely inconceivable.

 

[emigran]

I think for someone born in 1875, before the telephone and the electric light, who was an adult when powered flight and automobiles became a reality, who was moving into middle age when broadcasting was invented, and who lived long enough to look into a glowing box in their living room and see a human being set foot on the moon, the course of the world over their lifetime must've seemed absolutely inconceivable.

Recently I visited a friend whose dad is now 97 and quite lucid and active. He was sitting in the living room kind of vacantly staring at the TV... My friend said "Hey Pop, you alright??" He replied, "Why they talk so fast... everything too fast... I can't understand why they go so fast... !?!?"

 

[AmateisGal]

I think a lot of people find the idea that people can live perfectly happily without all, or even most of, the consumption-driven baggage of the modern era to be very, very threatening to their own worldview. Once you've guzzled down the Boys' Kool-Aid, and declared that you "can't live without" this or that bit of techie gimcrackery, anyone who doesn't buy into it is basically demonstrating that you're wrong, and some people take that as an act of aggression. So they become very very defensive, and that defensiveness become aggressive: HAHAHAHA WHAT A HYPOCRITE YOU POSTED THIS ON THE INTERNET YOU FAKER LIVING IN YOUR LITTLE FANTASY WORLD HA HA HA YOU THINK YOU"RE SO VINTAGE HA HA ad infinitum.

Of course, having said that, I'll also say it's just as possible to be a twenty-first-century consumer-fetishist with "vintage stuff" as it is with modern stuff. It's not about the stuff you own, it's about what that stuff means to your life.

Yes, exactly.

 

[tonyb]

... it's just as possible to be a twenty-first-century consumer-fetishist with "vintage stuff" as it is with modern stuff. It's not about the stuff you own, it's about what that stuff means to your life.

A semi-serious girlfriend back 25 years ago or so, a woman who came from a well-to-do family, found herself in somewhat less comfortable straits in the period shortly before and during our time as a couple.

When she came into my life she had recently returned from an extended stay in an ashram in India, which enlightened her worldview almost as much as it lightened her monetary reserves.

I will forever remember her finding it a huge revelation that her New-Agey friends and associates were every bit as materialistic as their parents and grandparents. This insight came to her during a Christmas shopping trip to a pricey retail mall housed in a converted old school building. She found very little in the boutiquey little shops there that she could afford.

I welcomed her to the club, and I resisted the temptation to laugh. (Although I must have rolled my eyes.)

Me, I have waaaaay more old hats and other vintage attire than I can make any reasonable claim to needing. Consumer-fetishist? Guilty as charged.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Of course, having said that, I'll also say it's just as possible to be a twenty-first-century consumer-fetishist with "vintage stuff" as it is with modern stuff. It's not about the stuff you own, it's about what that stuff means to your life.

There's a whole group of people who like to wear their "vintageness" on their sleeves for the whole world to see, while they bang their chests and say "look at me!...see, I'm into the 'X-era' lifestyle..." But what they're really doing is showing off the fact that they can afford a Victorian house stuffed with antique and reproduction knick knacks and shiny baubles, antique cars and vacations at the lake where they can wear their seersucker suits and boater hats. They look down their noses at regular "modern" working-class stiffs as the gullible and unenlightened. The working class of the Golden Era, or any other era, weren't living that way out some whacked sense of superiority, they lived that way because that's just the way it was. They weren't making a statement, they were simply trying to get by and live their lives the best they could.

 

[AmateisGal]

There's a whole group of people who like to wear their "vintageness" on their sleeves for the whole world to see, while they bang their chests and say "look at me!...see, I'm into the 'X-era' lifestyle..." But what they're really doing is showing off the fact that they can afford a Victorian house stuffed with antique and reproduction knick knacks and shiny baubles, antique cars and vacations at the lake where they can wear their seersucker suits and boater hats. They look down their noses at regular "modern" working-class stiffs as the gullible and unenlightened. The working class of the Golden Era, or any other era, weren't living that way out some whacked sense of superiority, they lived that way because that's just the way it was. They weren't making a statement, they were simply trying to get by and live their lives the best they could.

I don't see this couple as doing this, though. For them, it's a giant experiment. I've read through her website and some of her blog posts and it doesn't come across as pretentious at all. They truly love the lifestyle. They both have jobs, too - he works at a bike shop and she is a massage therapist (which is also Victorian in nature). They're not some rich snobs who just decided to lord it over rest of us, IMO.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There's a whole group of people who like to wear their "vintageness" on their sleeves for the whole world to see, while they bang their chests and say "look at me!...see, I'm into the 'X-era' lifestyle..." But what they're really doing is showing off the fact that they can afford a Victorian house stuffed with antique and reproduction knick knacks and shiny baubles, antique cars and vacations at the lake where they can wear their seersucker suits and boater hats. They look down their noses at regular "modern" working-class stiffs as the gullible and unenlightened. The working class of the Golden Era, or any other era, weren't living that way out some whacked sense of superiority, they lived that way because that's just the way it was. They weren't making a statement, they were simply trying to get by and live their lives the best they could.

Some of the most "vintage" people I've ever known have no idea that there even is such a thing as a "vintage scene," and would gape with amazement at the sight of well-to-do white-collar folks spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars in order to dress up as a CIO factory hand c. 1937.

 

[HudsonHawk]

I don't see this couple as doing this, though. For them, it's a giant experiment. I've read through her website and some of her blog posts and it doesn't come across as pretentious at all. They truly love the lifestyle. They both have jobs, too - he works at a bike shop and she is a massage therapist (which is also Victorian in nature). They're not some rich snobs who just decided to lord it over rest of us, IMO.

Oh I'm not suggesting the people in the article are this way at all. Just making a general point in response to Lizzie's comment about "vintage" consumerism.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I think the only people nowadays who can "vintage live" and not get guff about it are the Mennonites and the Amish. And even they have been very clever about commercializing it.