York Museums Trust

10 things only people born in the 80s will remember!

10 things only people born in the 80s will remember!

1) Blancmange packet

Blancmange. Did anyone actually like it?? Most likely your parents made you this a lot and, in a vain attempt to make it look tastier, they put it into a rabbit shaped mould. Still disgusting!

 

2) Scalextric

Took ages to set up. The cars never stayed on the track. And the grown-ups would get competitve, and you wouldn’t get a look in. Sound like anyone else’s Sunday afternoon’s growing up, or is it just us?

3) Handycam

Insta stories and TikTok may be all the rage now, but if you were a child in the 80s there’s a good chance your parents were keen to document every aspect of your life with a home video camera. No birthday, Christmas or family day out was safe from this bulky piece of kit.

4) Rubik’s Cube

Without YouTube videos to show you how to solve this you were a god if you mastered the Rubik’s Cube! Or maybe you just peeled the stickers off and rearranged them.

5) Smarties mug

If you received a Smarties Easter egg in the late 1980s, you got this mug!

6) Smarties with plastic lid

Sticking with Smarties…Do you remember collecting the plastic lids with letters underneath? Or maybe you held competitions with your siblings and friends to see how far you could pop the lid from the empty tube!

7) BMX burner bike

In the 1980s, the Raleigh Burner BMX bike was THE bike to have for perfecting jumps and stunts on homemade ramps in your street.

8) Betamax VCR

Whether it was being used for video rentals or to play back the embarrasing moments captured on the home video camera, the VCR was your parents favourite gadget…that you were never allowed to touch!

9) IZAL toilet paper

This scratchy, slightly waxy, disinfected toilet roll was found in every school toilet and public convenience. Once you’ve used it, you never forget!

10) 1980s kitchen

The kitsch enamel pans; the microwave; the overriding brown colour scheme! If you grew up in the 1980s there’s a good chance your kitchen looked a lot like this.