‘Rewind to the 90s’ and Relive Part of Your Childhood
We Double Dare you to time travel this weekend in LA
Ah, the 90s. When Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon were the hippest channels out there, Saturday morning cartoons were at the top of their game, and Beanie Babies were a thing. And that’s exactly when this weekend’s Rewind to the 90s pop-up experience turns the clock back to.
Ostensibly designed by New Balance and Foot Locker to market a new shoe line, the pop-up shop is mostly a place to take selfies with some 90s touchstones. Though, oddly, you could probably make it almost to the end without realizing what the activation was trying to sell you.
As for the installation itself?
For people of a certain age, it has the potential to be a nostalgia bomb. Your ticket in is a slap bracelet (and don’t worry, you’ll get a fanny pack on your way out)! There’s a teen’s bedroom filled with the requisite posters, pizza, and Hi-C! There’s Double Dare and slime, but like, not like actual slime. The iconic orange couch from Snick! A Nerf wall and a Koosh ball pit! Dream Blockbuster! Holograms! Foot Locker employees in their ref shirts! Ben Savage! Okay, he was just there to visit, but still.
It’s clearly been designed with 90s kids in mind, and as one, it was hard not to get a little swept up in it. They want people to take pictures with and relive parts of their childhood. In that sense, it’s a success. It captures the look and trappings of the 1990s, if not the feel. People seemed to be enjoying themselves, the full-sized holograms of yourself decked out in 90s gear and the Koosh ball pit were particularly popular.
Livening up the proceedings are a handful of actors from LA’s immersive scene courtesy of #Metaforyou. They’re around to provide extra engagement and a loose story structure to the whole thing. Though if you miss the actor in the first room, that there’s a story at all isn’t super obvious. Stand outs include a Marc Summers analogue complete with dad jeans and sports coat and an encouraging, if slightly bonkers video game character mystified by the phones people hand her to take pictures with.
The whole thing raises the question of just who these events are for. The influencers invited to the event were totally at home snapping selfies and diving into the ball pit. From an immersive angle though, there’s not a lot to do and the whole thing takes maybe ten minutes to walk through if you take pictures at every spot. The actors do help and that they’ve taken the time to create characters at all gives it a little spark. It makes for an interesting contrast with Noah’s trip into The InkHole where the influencers were the ones who were a little lost.
As a pop-up shop only around for a weekend, Rewind to the 90s isn’t a bad time. It’s light and it’s breezy and there’s not a lot to it but it does give a rush of nostalgia. And in 2018, who can blame people for wanting to relive a piece of their childhood and plop down on that orange couch?
Rewind to the 90s runs through August 14th at 939 Maple Ave in DTLA. Admission is free, and don’t let the Eventbrite fool you: walkups are welcome. See event ticket site for more details, including contests and special shoe releases.
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