Bureau of Lost Culture: Blinded by The Light – A Countercultural History of Spectacles (09/05/2021)

Morrissey, Dorothy Parker, Le Corbusier, Harold Lloyd, Janis Joplin, Andy Warhol, Alan Ginsberg, Michael Caine, Gloria Steinem, Buddy Holly, John Lennon, Jarvis Cocker – all had one thing in common – spectacles. (Around 65% of the British population need some sort of vision correction.)

Writer and cultural commentator Travis Elborough returns to the Bureau to talk about his forthcoming book: ‘Through the Looking Glasses: The Spectacular Life of Spectacles’. We take a long gaze at the wonderful world of glasses from the Middle Ages to the present – along with a cast of spec wearing monks, artisans, foppish dandies, wonks, nerds, bohemians, bands, spies and film stars as we examine the story of eyewear through the lens of the counterculture.