Keep Calm and Carry On spoofs

March 19th, 2009 by Graham

I was reading this article in The Guardian about the popularity of the Keep Calm and Carry On poster.

We’ve certainly seen the Keep Calm and Carry On phenomenon in action at Fabiola & Sing Sing, with lots of interest in our Keep Calm and Carry On tea towels, Keep Calm and Carry On mugs and even our Keep Calm and Carry On Shopping shopper bags by Catherine Colebrook.

You really know when something is taking off, of course, when people begin to spoof it – creating their own posters and variations on the Keep Calm and Carry On motto.

Don't keep calm and carry on

As you can see above, we’ve even seen the police make a humourous spin on the design in a newspaper advert.

So, what’s the appeal of the Keep Calm and Carry On message? Well, for a rather cynical view we need to turn to Dr Lesley Prince, a lecturer in social psychology at Birmingham University:

“It is a quiet, calm, authoritative, no-bullshit voice of reason. It’s not about British stiff upper lip, really. The point is that people have been sold a lie since the 1970s. They were promised the earth and now they’re worried about everything – their jobs, their homes, their bank, their money, their pension. This is saying, look, somebody out there knows what’s going on, and it’ll be all right”

Whether you share Dr Prince’s cynical point of view or not, you can join in the fun with the Keep Calm and Carry On goodies in the Fabiola & Sing Sing online store – don’t forget we’re offering 20% off in our Mother’s Day sale!

Category: Cool Britannia, Retail therapy | 2 Comments

2 Comments

Comment by Andrew:

I’ve knocked up a ‘keep calm and carry on’ parody generator at http://www.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk – just enter your text, choose an image, font and colours, and away you go!
- 10:42 pm, April 13, 2009.
Comment by Dr Bex Lewis:

I’ve been keeping track of the Keep Calm poster phenomenon, as I wrote about it in my PhD thesis (all the historical information initiated from my research) – been fascinating to see what it does! http://ww2poster.wordpress.com/
- 3:20 pm, July 8, 2009.