If you were a child in the 1970s, you know something that is hard to explain to anyone who was not there.
You know what it felt like to be outside from morning until dark with no way for anyone to reach you. You know the particular texture of Saturday morning cartoons, the smell of a 8-track tape, the way AM radio sounded coming through a car window in summer.
You were a 70s child. And that decade shaped you in ways you are still discovering.
What It Meant to Grow Up in the 1970s
The 1970s were a decade of contradictions. Politically turbulent. Culturally alive. The decade of Watergate and disco, of the women's movement gaining real momentum, of a particular kind of freedom that children born before and after never quite experienced the same way.
Children of the 70s grew up with fewer structured activities and more unstructured time. They rode bikes without helmets and came home when the streetlights came on. They negotiated their own social worlds without adult supervision. They figured things out by doing them.
That upbringing produced something. A certain self-sufficiency. A comfort with ambiguity. An ability to entertain yourself. A tolerance for imperfection that comes from having grown up in an era before everything was curated.
The Music That Raised You
Ask any 70s child what they remember and music is always in the answer.
This was the decade of Fleetwood Mac and Carole King, of ABBA and David Bowie, of the Eagles and Stevie Wonder. Music that did not whisper — it announced itself. It had something to say and it said it with a full band and a melody you could not shake for forty years.
The women who grew up in the 70s absorbed that music into their bones. They learned to harmonize in the back seat of station wagons. They wore out records. They remember exactly where they were when they first heard certain songs, and the feeling has not faded.
The Women the 70s Produced
Girls who grew up in the 1970s came of age at a particular moment in the women's movement. They watched women enter the workforce in new numbers. They grew up with mothers who were figuring it out in real time — navigating a world that was changing faster than anyone had a roadmap for.
Those girls became women who learned to advocate for themselves, because they had to. Who learned that things worth having required work, because that was the example they saw. Who developed a particular kind of resilience that comes from having grown up in an era that was not trying very hard to protect them.
They are now in their 50s and 60s. They have grey hair and strong opinions and no remaining patience for things that are not worth their time. They are, in many ways, exactly who the 70s trained them to be.
For the 70s Child — A Celebration
If you were a child of the 70s, or if you love someone who was, the 70s Child T-Shirt and 70s Child Hat at Art in Aging are for you. Soft, wearable, and made for the woman who grew up in a decade worth celebrating.
Pair it with the 1970 T-Shirt for the woman born in that specific year, or the Fine Like Red Wine T-Shirt for the one who has only gotten better with age.
The 70s child turned out well. She deserves a shirt that says so.
Browse the full Art in Aging collection — made for women who know exactly who they are and wear it without apology.
