What is Retro?

[mobilemechanical]

Hi, quite new here.

Hoping to get an answer to a dispute I'm having between friends.

I personally feel retro is something from my childhood so late 80's/early 90's and older.

my mates reckon it must be 70's and another is 80's only.


What is the gentle consenus on "What is retro?"

[dreadnought]

To me it's something from your past that had fallen from favour, but is now having a resurgence of interest. Unfortunately it's a tag that's being given to a lot of stuff that doesn't deserve it. "modern retro" stuff is basically someone's way of trying to sell tat.

[andyborris]

Anything that's had a period of time were it was unliked, unloved and unwanted. The survivors from this time are then looked at with fresh eyes, usually by people who were too young to remember said items when they were new and are now found to be desirable by these people.

With cars, it tends to be late 1970's onward.

Basically, Retro is anything you say it is! As long as it's not new, new stuff can only be retro style.

[MrSpeedy]

^^ Really ?

To get back on track, this question has been asked eleven billionty three times, and there is no definitive answer.

You can have a modern car styled in a retro way. You can have an old car styled in a modern way.

It's as much a style/mindset as an age of vehicle.

Having said that, Anything with body coloured/moulded bumpers and wing mirrors is too modern for me

[86mike]

Generally i think a car under 25 years old is not Retro it's just old. Not the last generation of cars but the one before :-)

[pat4610]

you can ask 100 people that question,and you will get 100 different answers. Dreadnought is right some people use the tag retro and classic to try and flog a motor at a higher price. For me retro is a style and design from a previous decade,and there is not really a cut of date,for me it,s cars from the 60,s, my childhood, that,s why i have a 63 and 65 motor

[trigger]

Jun 7, 2013 16:22:58 GMT robscott said:

retro = your mum's fanneh

How old are you?

Personally any car 20-35 years old roughly but some newer cars could be classed as retro, thinking MX5's etc.

[matto]

IMO Retro is the point where something has stopped just being old. It doesn't actually matter how old it really is just so long as it's passed through the 'being old' phase and is now retro!

[BenzBoy]

Jun 7, 2013 16:00:26 GMT mobilemechanical said:

Hi, quite new here.

Hello and welcome! Have a read of this, it should answer your question.



PS: The old "What is retro?" threads tend not to go particularly well...

[fred]

Its a never ending question
which has been asked on here a gazillion times
no answer will be valid

[PandaSelecta]

Personally i think retro is mid 70s up to the end of the 80s, maybe edging into the start of the 90s with cars that were designed in the 80s (mk2 golf etc). Some cars in the 90s like the escort cosworth are modern classics, but not retro.

[Deleted]

Jun 7, 2013 20:46:57 GMT BenzBoy said:

Jun 7, 2013 16:00:26 GMT mobilemechanical said:

Hi, quite new here.

Hello and welcome! Have a read of this, it should answer your question.



PS: The old "What is retro?" threads tend not to go particularly well...

Here is one of them:

retrorides.proboards.com/thread/133504/when-retro-begin-personally

[Deleted]

retro to me is no airbags no cat converter no dashboard full of warning lights and an engine you understand with basic mechanical knowledge
only my opinion as theres a zillion explanations out there

[Brian Damaged]

Pigeonholes are for pigeons.

[Dom]

There should be a locked thread for this at the top of the forum to stop more appearing.

[Robinxr4i]

Jun 8, 2013 16:40:40 GMT Brian Damaged said:

Pigeonholes are for pigeons.

What Brian said. Personally I don't worry about what is or isn't retro, it's subjective and means different things to different people.

[chaseracer]

I think this encapsulates the issue...

Jul 25, 2012 10:45:15 GMT lae said:

When you forget how curse word they were when they were new.

;-)