Tag Archives: retro advertising

Vintage Ad Browser

If you didn’t catch this yesterday, it will be the coolest thing you see on the Internet today. The Vintage Ad Browser has more than 120,000 ads from, “a variety of sources, including comic books, CD-Roms, websites, APIs, your submissions, book, magazine & comic book scans, and more.” The ads are categorized by topic (Celebrity, Coke, Future, Perfume, Office, etc.) and then within each topic categorized by decade.

The Ads go back to the 1800s all the way up the the 2000s. It’s an amazing collection. Be careful when clicking because once you start you might end up losing an hour or two. I just spent 45 minutes trying to an ad to demonstrate how awesome this collection is and got lost. . . It really is that cool.

Take a look at this one with Frank Zappa, easily my favorite so far. What’s your favorite?

Friday Links: All about the scrollbars

• Must click of the week, Scroll Clock. Really, you have to see this.
• On Google Wave’s scrollbars. They are kind of funky.
• Clients from hell.
• 80% of US Consumers won’t pay for online content.
• The Lazy Designer’s Guide to Success
• A real-life replica of The Simpson’s house
• How to talk like a 1950s hipster
• NerdCart: A mobile workstation and media center
• 8 product categories that were fun to advertise while they lasted: typerwriters, seatbelts, and taperecorders are amongst the list.

Too good to miss: Top 10 Ironic Ads from History

Here’s one that you don’t want to miss, The Consumerist’s Top 10 Ironic Ads from History. It’s a must see for irony-lovers and advertisers alike!

Not only is it a nice little stroll down advertising and design history, but it makes you laugh at some of the things we thought it would be a good idea to get people to buy (leaded paint, heroin, you know, the usual corner drugstore purchases). It also makes you wonder what we’ll look back on and think of as not such a good idea now.

Also, my favorite is the James Dean PSA for safe driving. Nice.

Collection of Science & Tech Ads from the 50s and 60s

Beckman Ad. Originally uploaded by bustbright
This is a beautiful collection of ads for science and technology (found via Coudal). I love the modernist design, the sexism of some of the ads I could do without.

You can see the entire set on Flickr put together by BustBright.