Get This Rusty ‘West Village’ Trashcan for a Mere $100 at Anthropologie
Want to bring a piece of NYC nostalgia into your home? Look no further than this “handmade” pre-rusted trashcan, available for the very reasonable price of $99.95 (down from $148!) at Anthropologie.
Benjamin Miller, former planning policy director for the city sanitation department, told DNAinfo that the “West Village Corrugated Can” resembles the metal trash receptacles the entire city used (i.e. not just the West Village) up until 1969. They were called “ash cans,” as they collected the wood and coal used to heat homes at the time, and were certainly not trendy or valuable.
Miller recounts the downfall of the ash can due to the great garbage strike of 1968 when sanitation workers refused to pick up trash for nine days after a new city contract. Hardware stores sold out of the metal bins, so Dow Chemical swept in with their plastic trash bags. The city revised its rule that metal bins were necessary for rat control, and the Glad Bag became a household name.
Though Anthropologie is trying to play the nostalgia card and touting the can as an “online exclusive” with options for rope or wooden handles, similar metal bins are available for a quarter of the price (and none of the pretension) on sites like Amazon.
[Via DNAinfo]
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