Juan les Pins, 60's...
Everything has changed, and at the same time, everything's the same.
In the end, only the girls have really changed, leaving the class and sexy fashion from the sixties for the disgusting flesh and silicon market of the 3^rd millenium... Times change!
To listen while looking at this picture : Dany Logan, "Mon cœur à Juan les Pins"...

Edit 18/04/2007 :
Till now I only had a partiel scan of this photo... I come back today on this picture (original article from 2006/09/30), as I finally found the original post card (thanks to eBay, as usual!)!


The card has been send on August 20^th 1967. Dauphine and DS populated the streets, a big "Fly TWA" sign was above the Crystal... The GrandMarnier on the left still exists, as well as the LunaPark on its right side, which has became a place full of noisy, blinking arcade games... I imagine that by that time, it was full of Flippers!

Yet another vintage postcard found on eBay... I've been seeking it for a while, and I finally got it! A pure marvel, with a shiny Karmann-Ghia Low-Light as guest star...
Having a closer view to the picture, I discovered it was black and white, then colorized added later on. The sky, so perfect, is a fake : under high magnification, it appears that the original sky has been cut off and replaced by this blue shaded background! The vintage Photoshop retouching...
There's no indicated date, but referring to the ID plates (most recent is DL 06) I assume it's been taken around 1956. The poster on the Casino announces the election of the Reine des Fleurs de la Riviera (the Riviera's Queen of Flowers) on Saturday June 23^rd. In 56 only, June 23^rd was a Saturday, which confirms the year. Due to the light and the way people are dressed, we can guess the picture was taken in May-June 1956...


Half a century later, the Crystal bar is still at the same place, the book store as well... The Eden Beach Casino, on the right, unfortunately turned into a huge glass-covered building, throwing shadow on the street from the middle of the afternoon...

In the far background, the Hotel Provencal was still in activity ; the yellow-earth color of the top is a colorization mistake, it was pure white. This beautiful, huge building was built in 1927, and was one of the most important palaces on the Riviera. It then was abandoned in the mid-seventies, and it's nothing but a giant ruin today. A renovation project has been set up to turn it into luxury lofts, but there's been so many projects already... wait'n'see...

After the VW Beetle becoming the New Beetle, after the Mini becoming BMW, after the Fiat 500 soon to become Trepiùno... And I forget some more on purpose, like the Renault Fifty... Here is one more proof that the Fifties Design remains ageless!


So, this is a modern evocation of the mythic Solex (designed by Pininfarina), the e-solex!
Aesthetically, the relation is obvious, but this time, the engine is electric (!), and driving the rear wheel (!!)... Two disc brakes stop the beast. Times change...

Some might see it as sacrilege. I'd rather see it as a tribute...

[via Nostalgi'Art]

Huuuumm, the fifties, the Streamline design, Raymond Loewy (see raymondloewy.com)... Such an era, that gave the very firt concepts cars, in the after-war euphoria, a time of shining chromes, when nobody was thinking economy and global warming...

Here is a great example of this period, a monster I discovered a few month ago : the GM Futurliner (hence the name!):


Twelve of those vehivles where built by General Motors, for the "Parade of Progress" : a tour of 300 cities, from 1953 to 1956, to show the know-how of GM and their latest technologies... The very beginnings of the "avionics era" of US cars. Each Futurliner contained a diorama, a display...

A group of enthusiasts is restoring one of those monsters : futurliner.com, you must have a look at this...
More pictures can be found on Thrilling Wonder.

At the end of the day, the real question is : how many tons of chrome polish does it take to clean one of those beasts?

The Turini mountain pass is a legendary stage for all the Rallye enthusiasts, and so since the late 50's! This stage is part of the Monte-Carlo Rally (Monaco).
A 32 kilometers stage, serpentine as hell (34 hairpins turns!), 1200m. to climb up to the top...


Here is a picture a friend of mine gave me : the picture was taken on winter 1959, and you can see several members from his family (his father is riding the second Vespa), riding theirs '56 ACMA's to the snowy Turini... I know this place, the temperatures there, the low performance of those scooters, their poor road holding, and this makes me feel much respectful!
Thanks Régis for this never-seen-before photograph!

Wanna know more about the Turini : Col-de-Turini.com (available both in French and English)...

Establishing the history of the brand took me longer than I expected... So here is a short summary of what I've learned about those boats.

Here is a beautiful tribute (I almost dropped a tear! ), broadcasted in Mexico, while the Beetle was definitely off the production lines in Puebla.

While the VW is not more built in Europe since 1978, the Puebla factory, opened in 1964, will produce more than 5 millions vehicles until this bloody July 30^th 2003.

More than 22 millions Beetles were built worldwide... Bye bye Herbie.

Two more old pictures of Albatross boats...

The first one looks like it's been taken at the "Amsterdam Yacht Show", maybe in 1959 (it seems to be written on the poster .


The second picture is more interesting... From the informations I got (many thanks Fred!), the big yacht to which the Albatross is hanged to belonged to the Prince Rainier of Monaco. Which confirms the information that he owned several Albatross runabouts...


Well, I'll have to take care of this little boy if I want to play with it next summer...

Dany Logan, "Mon cœur à Juan les Pins" (My heart in Juan les Pins), July 1961.



Deliciously kitsch, no? The most attentive of you won't have missed the Lambretta LD in the background...

Seen on eBay, the Albatross Super Sport that belonged to H.R.H. Prince Philip Duke of Edinburgh (Queen Elizabeth II's husband) is for sale! (voir l'annonce) So classy, the dashboard is totally polished, as the hull is made out of aluminium!... This boat, bought in '56, was used on board the HMY Britannia for water-skiing, until '67. What a piece of history! Prince Rainier of Monaco would have own 6 of those boats... I have to dig into this story, who knows, aurait possédé 6 de ces bateaux... à creuser, qui sait, there's maybe one or two left to save!

As seen on YouTube : OK, so it can take a wakeboard out of the water... Sounds cool to me.

I took this photograph in the mountain pass of Vence, in September 1997. The pick-up's owner, probably more than 90 years old, arrived running, scared that I would steal his "marvel"...
Unfortunatly, this pick-up has now disappeared, probably towed away by some scrap merchant, the old owner being dead and the land being bought by a young couple willing to "clean" their backyard... That's a pity, the chrome on the headlight resisted 40 years against ice, snow, rain and winds in this moutain area... Things were built to last, by that time!

Juan les Pins, March 1977... Looks more or less like nowadays... You probably didn't miss the convertible Karmann-Ghia on the left, hum?

I love those old pictures... Here are 2 postcards found on eBay, both written in May 1959.

This street is almost identical today, but the atmosphere has changed... Obviously, cars are not the same, but above all Third Millenium tourists are way more soaking of solar cream and silicon, and wants more out of his money... He becomes more and more demanding, which draws him not to respect the environment anymore (already highly impacted in the area), treating everybody like sh...

As a fair return, local restaurants, making their annual revenue over 2 months, are proposing not-that-fresh meals, as they don't need the client to come back later... One way or another, the client won't come back anyway!

That's sad, that's very sad.
Architecture is still the same, but the spirit is a bit gone... Strange feeling to miss a period I did not even know myself, uh?

Click on the pictures to see them full size...



Edit 2008-03-20 : same place, nowadays, on Flickr...

Here it is, nothing more to say, pictures are speaking by themselves. HotRod Magazine, August 1949, found on eBay in great shape... Pure collector!

Here is how the story began...
A friend of mine, Fred, owns this boat for years, moored in the Monaco harbor, right below the Prince's palace.

But time is running short to find a new house for it (the boat, not the Prince), because the harbor got recently privatized, and a typical Monaco privilege has disappeared : freeness for boats under 4 meters long.

Now, the Albatross could end up on breakage... Which would be a pity!
So I bought the little boat, as Fred did not have enough spare time to take care of it, but moreover to prevent it from being crushed in a breakage...

September 29^th 2006, I'm off to retrieve the beast in Monte-Carlo...


Here we are, the Albatross is safe... Next step, get it back up and running, and go play with it as soon as the weather allows it!