Waterbeds

In 1968, Charles Prior Hall, a furniture designer in California decided to create the world’s most comfortable chair.

Taking his cue from the very popular bean bag chairs of the time, he filled a large inflatable vinyl bag with liquid and titled his creation “the Incredible Creeping Chair.” Unfortunately, he found that when he sat in it he sank so far into the chair that he felt he was being swallowed by it.

He abandoned his idea to develop a chair and filled a rectangular piece of vinyl with warm water and called his creation the Water Bed. Unfortunately, he found that when the water cooled, the mattress became ice-cold and clammy, and immediately set about developing a line of accessories for the bed, including a heater, a liner and a patch kit.

Though it was the butt of many jokes (don’t leave the windows open in the winter – it might freeze ha ha ha), the waterbed soon became a necessary home furnishing, and no 70s swinger was complete without one. By the 1980s, one in every four mattresses sold was a waterbed.