If the Blogfather himself is talking about it, then it would be incredibly remiss if mention was not made of the fact that 2006 is the 60th anniversary of the bikini.
The swimsuit industry should have had Brian Hyland on retainer.
When, as a teenage pop singer in the 1960s, he warbled about an Itsy-Bitsy Teenie-Weenie Yellow Polka-Dot Bikini, he triggered a buying craze among eager-to-bare-all teenagers across the country.
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the naming, if not necessarily the invention, of the modern bikini. And the market for the ever-shrinking and ever-more-elaborate two-piece is still growing, as are prices.
A big driver behind the increased sales: pop stars influencing a younger generation. But instead of singing about teeny bikinis like Hyland did, today’s celebrities are wearing the skimpy things?everywhere.
According to the NPD Group, sales of two-piece swimsuits grew by 20.5 per cent from May 2005 to April 2006, up from 18.8 per cent for the 12 months prior. Combined with the sales of swim separates (mix-and-match bikini parts), the industry reached $1.7 billion in revenue.
Television shows are encouraging teens to strip down to the bare essentials, and shots of Jennifer Aniston or Lindsay Lohan in swimsuits fill the many celebrity-oriented magazines on newsstands
There’s been much analysis of this cultural phenomenon, and even a Bikini Book
Gratuitous photo below the fold 
June 30th, 2006 at 1:13 pm
Hmm… The bikini swimsuit got it’s name *from* the atoll, not the atoll getting it from the swimsuit… I never realized that before…
(And yes, I’m bored enough today to have gone and researched that, once I saw the significance of the “60 year” mark)
July 1st, 2006 at 1:24 am
Happy Anniversary
In case you hadn’t heard about the bikini birthday yet:…