In the 1970s, when I was a kid, my father was a VP and an account guy at BBDO. Sometimes I would go to his office downtown in my rugby shirt and contrast- stitched jeans to "help out." I noticed that many agency people would go to fern bars for lunch and again for cocktail hour.
The fern bar was a hip, fresh concept in the mid-1970s. Now just a forlorn memory, its fronds gone brownish at the edges, the fern bar is hopelessly passé. Or like so many trendy, dated things, maybe it's just waiting to be rediscovered. Ad people have always striven to be "edgy," appropriating the latest cultural novelties to "brand" their own personae, and I've always associated the fern bar with that world at that time. It's stored away with memories of shearling coats, BMW 2002s, old Jaguars, the Grateful Dead, banjos, intimidating audiophile stereos, long-haired hardasses in suits, Rolling Stone magazine, the National Lampoon, reel-to-reel video, the crisp snap of foamcore mounting boards, and the woozy smell of hundreds of Ad Markers lined up along the wall like little soldiers.
This blog is dedicated to the watering hole that sustained the adman on the prowl, and offered him leafy shelter when he was on the lam — from the herd, from the hounds, and from the outside world that he could measure, cajole and convince with skill, but never quite escape.
O blog, I christen thee Fern Bar!
