Design Indaba 2016: the 1996 ad campaign that encouraged British housewives to throw away their fussy furnishings helped transform attitudes to design, according to ad executive Naresh Ramchandani (+ movie).
Ramchandani, who wrote the slogan and the song that accompanied the TV advert, said the campaign ushered in a new era of clean, contemporary design to the average British household.
"It was proper piece of propaganda; total propaganda," Ramchandani told Dezeen. "We pitched for it and we won with a preposterous idea: our strategy was to change British taste over the next five years."
Dezeen spoke to Naresh Ramchandani after his lecture at the 2016 Design Indaba conference in Cape Town Ramchandani agreed that the campaign achieved its aim, becoming part of a wider cultural and social sea change that gained momentum with Tony Blair's election victory the following year.
"Tony Blair sweeping to power really helped it, because in Britain it felt like it was time for a new broom," said Ramchandani, speaking to Dezeen after speaking at the Design Indaba conference in Cape Town last week.
"There was even a headline in The Daily Express I think, which said 'Downing Street chucks out its chintz' when John Major left and Tony Blair came in."
...