The Return of the Ericofon

What’s half joystick, half telephone, and all fun? The Ericofon! Designed in the 1950s by Ericsson, the one-piece phone (The Dial in the Base ‘Comes to You‘!) initially struggled to succeed in the United States, then firmly in the grips of Bell Telephone’s monopoly, but steadily gained acceptance in the 1960s, when an Ohio company offered the spage-age contraption in a whopping 18 colors. Swayed by the promise of “Elegance…for eloquence,” consumers could choose from hues such as Nordic Blue, Candle Glow (not to be confused with the sunnier Golden Glow), the grape jellyish Royal Dubonnet, and Taj Mahal, which sounds a lot more exotic than “white.”