Shops on A-Deck: transatlantic consumption, the masculine tourist and the metropolitanisation of the ocean liner

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article is about the branches of fashionable London menswear retailers on ocean liners 1930–1960. It examines the design and spaces of shops on Cunard liners, and the connected discourses about masculine consumption cultures and geographies contained in trade journals, advertising and business records. The article draws together perspectives from consumption and design histories and geographies. It addresses the intersection between men's fashion, consumption and travel geographies on liner decks. It considers how metropolitan menswear retailers, adjusting to changing overseas markets, engaged with transatlantic leisure travel cultures. This created a complex web of production, retail and consumption spanning the Atlantic, whilst also demonstrating the elasticity of metropolitan consumption geographies. This study of liner shops re-examines the urban, 'located' nature of mid twentieth century fashionable consumption culture. It rethinks the ‘otherness’ of historic maritime life, repositioning the interior of the ocean liner as an extension of and staging of West End consumption space. It is also explored as a place of transformation, for preparing for the metropolitan.