‘Package Holiday 1968-1985’: a very British love affair in pictures

Vintage photos of Brits on holiday in Spain from the book Package Holiday 1968-1985.

A new book, The Package Holiday 1968 - 1985, published by Hoxton Mini Press (available from Amazon), taps into 1970s Brits’ love of sun, sea and teensy weensy Speedos.

In 1960s Britain, jetting ‘abroad’ was a pursuit associated with sophisticated socialites like Aristotle and Jacqueline Onassis, characters such as James Bond and working-class superstars the Beatles. It was only the late 1950s that British European Airways set up its ‘package holiday’ deals to Spain, incorporating short flights, hotel, all-day board, and lashings of family-friendly fun, with Valencia being the first destination. The deals were a hit, and the White Coast region got a canny rebrand as ‘Costa Blanca’ soon after. 

Package Holiday: a very British love affair in pictures

Sunny delight: It was only in 1958 that British European Airways had set up ‘package holiday’ deals to Spain (Image credit: Trevor Clark. Courtesy, Hoxton Press. Copyright, Jake Clark)

By the 1970s, many Britons, accustomed to their nation’s short or often rain-drenched summers, were thirsty for a taste of the White Coast and its exotic promise of tans, al fresco dining, and bourgeois sports such as table tennis. The chance to slip into something more comfortable by way of Speedos, bikinis and super-short shorts was an added, and most obviously welcome, extra.

The White Coast offered an exotic promise of tans, al fresco dining, and bourgeois sports (Image credit: Trevor Clark. Courtesy, Hoxton Press. Copyright, Jake Clark)

None of this new-found Technicolor fun was lost on the London Royal Air Force-trained photographer Trevor Clark, an Eastender who, having set up a studio in Soho, had become the go-to photographer in 1960s Swinging London, documenting the exploits of bands such as the Beatles and The Rolling Stones while he was at it.

Trevor Clark's images capture the ambitions of a generation eager to escape life in a rapidly de-industrialising Britain (Image credit: Trevor Clark. Courtesy, Hoxton Press. Copyright, Jake Clark)

Clark fancied a few rays himself and spotted a gap in the market photographing the wave of newly established resorts in the Balearics, and Mallorca in particular. His images, now collected in a book by his son Jake Clark, not only captured the glamour of the location – those saturated colours would have seemed like a window into another universe on the brochure stands of high-street travel agents back in Blighty – but reflected the ambitions of a generation eager to escape the social and economic restraints of life in a rapidly de-industrialising Britain. Two weeks in Magaluf were, then, an exercise in aspiration acted out in the new style of nylon leisure suits and, a dream that was accessible in the way that Carnaby Street’s delights of the previous decade simply weren’t.

The Package Holiday 1968 - 1985, by Jake Clark with photography by Trevor Clark, at hoxtonminipress.com, also available at Amazon

(Image credit: Trevor Clark. Courtesy, Hoxton Press. Copyright, Jake Clark)