The vintage art of typewriting

I was moseying around an antiques fair in Buxton Pavillion Gardens in Derbyshire over the weekend, when I stumbled upon a curiously characterful vintage find..

.An Underwood portable typewriter, still in its carrying case – and bearing the original warranty. This magnificent machine must surely have been the iPad of its day?

There’s no date on the typewriter or the case, but the dealer suggested this model dates from around 1929. Unusually, the shift and caps keys are in Eastern European typeface - can someone please let ShopCurious know which language this is?

Anyway, it brought back memories of layers of coloured copy paper – yellow, pink, green and blue… and multiple Tipp-ex papers to erase errors.

Oh, and forget iPad art a la David Hockney: What about this story from Oddity Central about Paul Smith, an artist with severe cerebral palsy, who creates the most extraordinary art using an old fashioned typewriter.

Who needs modern technology…


Do you?

Vintage Scout games...

A slightly longer than expected break from blogging to spend time with my ailing father, who sadly died a couple of weeks ago…

 
 
Anyway, it’s good to be back. You may wish to check out our latest Curious Trends posts.

And if you want to know what Prince Harry has in common with the Boy Scouts, take a look at my post today over at The Dabbler.


 




Talking of Scouts, we’ve some curiously collectable Scout memorabilia at ShopCurious, including vintage books that will come in handy if you’re organizing your own alternative Olympic Games – or are already suffering from games nostalgia.

Are you?

Medal-worthy or mundane?

There’s nothing curious about Stella McCartney, except that her newly opened store in London’s Fulham Road is curiously large – especially at a time when so many of the older established shops in the area (think Betty Jackson) have closed down.

Of course, McCartney has a famous father, whose voice seems to have gone off the boil at bit – though I suppose Hey Jude does have an Olympic chorus at the end... With all her unnatural advantages, I was trying exceptionally hard to not like the Olympic designer du jour - until I heard her in interview, earlier this year, at the Vogue Festival.

What a lovely lady – so down to earth and supremely sensible sounding.

Anyway, ShopCurious would like to hear your views on her designs. Personally, I find them magnificently mundane. But perhaps you think they’re medal-worthy?

Do you?