Inflatable Furniture Of The Late 90s Was Inadvertently Symbolic

It looked shiny and futuristic, but was actually uncomfortable and your ass often hit the floor: just like most Millennials’ futures.

Found on Pinterest // There is no way a similar pizza party happened outside of this product shoot. That ottoman would be deflating like our purchasing power come 2008.

I distinctly recall the first time I ever saw an inflatable chair: it was the summer of 1998 and this catalog called Just Nikki, which appeared to be like the mailbox staple dELiA*s but on steroids, had an entire section of delightfully impractical home goods.

There was even an inflatable 3-seat couch and a whole-ass bed.

I didn’t actually know a single soul who had inflatable furniture. I remember going to the Jersey shore and practically wanting to live in this store that had a neon pink inflatable couch and orange chair, complete with Clueless-esque feather pens, faux fur covered journals, and a rug where I shudder to think how many Beanie Babies died for it. So it was a relatively rare sight in the wild that didn’t seem to exist in as many homes as those catalogs would have you believe.

But I saw that blue and purple chair in the Just Nikki catalog that would match my hair in a few years, and wanted one oh so badly. A shimmering beacon of blue Jell-O so much unlike the dull gray and floral wallpapered room I shared with my sister. Another beautifully bizarre item that seemed to only exist in video games and TV shows, but that would be rejected from my Iron Curtain household for not being old, cheap, or hideous enough.

The shitty little house I refused to call home was a time capsule to 1976, complete with a TV antenna that resembled a stripper pole and had to be rotated just right when the screen got too static-y. I longed to leave, abusive cohabitants notwithstanding, so I could have the best of both vintage and modern.

In just five years I’d be 18, and could have my own apartment that looked just like the fucking cool places where the Moxie girls rode skateboards and listened to Metallica and Pantera, yet could pull off a vinyl tube top and heels. And I planned on buying all of that Manic Panic blue inflatable furniture when I was a legal adult with my own money, and couldn’t be told how to spend it. It would make a nice contrast to the black walls I planned on…