in the decade mirrored many of the social changes of the Sixties. Mary Quant became

famous for popularising the mini skirt which became the epitome of 1960s fashion. The mini was

designed to be free and liberating for women, allowing them to “run and jump”. Her fashion designs

used simple geometric shapes and colours which gave women a new kind of femininity. Women

were free to wear more playful, youthful clothes that would have seemed outrageous ten years

before. By the late Sixties, psychedelic prints and vibrant colours began appearing on clothes as the

hippie movement gathered pace.

Technological advancements of the 1960s drastically changed how people spent their leisure time.

The increase in employment in factories and increase in money allowed people to spend more on

leisure activities. Colour television and pocket transistor radios allowed people to spend their free

time listening to music and watching TV. Every teenager owned a transistor radio allowing them to

listen to pop music on the move. The microwave oven shortened the amount of time women spent

in the kitchen, further allowing them more freedom and time to enjoy themselves. By the end of the

decade, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin achieved the impossible by becoming the first men on the

moon in 1969. It ended the decade on a note of optimism and the ability to dream for something

bigger and better.

Although rock and roll began having

an effect on Britain in the 1950s, it wasn’t until the early Sixties and the emergence of ‘British

Invasion’ groups like The Beatles, that music truly began its revolutionary changes.