Imagine the 1940s: swing music is blasting from the radio, and a new, futuristic gadget is starting to make its way into Swedish homes – a magical light machine that promises to give you sun-kissed skin in the middle of winter!
But what was this sunburn-causing invention actually called? Well, at that time it was the ultraviolet lamp or quartz lamp that took center stage, and sometimes it could be given the slightly more poetic name of sun lamp.
Let's take a trip back in time and take a closer look at this glowing phenomenon!
In the 1940s, there was no talk of modern solariums with reclining glass beds and built-in fans. No, no, this was a time when technology was more raw, more charming and perhaps a little more... adventurous. The quartz lamp was the star of the show. The name came from the quartz glass in the lamp, which could withstand the high temperatures and let through those mysterious ultraviolet rays that could conjure up a burn – or, if you weren't careful, skin as red as a boiled crayfish. You sat in front of this device, often a clumsy thing with an aura of scientific mystery, and let the rays do their job. It was a bit like having your own sun on your table, but without the palm trees and beach waves.
Calling it a sun lamp wasn't entirely wrong either. The name captured the dream of capturing the magic of the sun, even if the winter outside the window offered blizzards and sub-zero temperatures. But it wasn't just a tan that people were after. Quartz lamps were also used for light therapy and even to treat everything from winter fatigue to various ailments – it was a time when UV light was seen as a miracle cure for most! The doctor could prescribe a while in front of the lamp as if it were penicillin, and in the home it became a status symbol to own such a modern piece of equipment.
But it wasn't without its risks. Nobody had heard of SPF 50 at the time, and the instructions weren't always crystal clear. If you sat there too long, you could easily go from "Riviera chic" to "just stepped out of a pot." Still, the fascination was total – here you had a device that could trick your skin into thinking you had just returned from the Mediterranean, even if the closest you had come was a trip to the bathhouse in the neighboring town.
So the next time you hear the word tanning bed and think of today's high-tech sunless tanning machines, think back to the pioneers of the 1940s. With their quartz lamps and sunlamps, they paved the way for the tan dream, one glow at a time – and perhaps with the occasional giggly miss in the process. Because who could resist being beamed down to a golden complexion, when winter felt eternal and summer was just a faded memory?