Does anybody else remember the tradition of glory boxes?
Some called it a “hope chest”, because it was a symbol of a young woman’s hopes and dreams of marriage and setting up her own home (do you want a bucket?!); others had a “bottom drawer”.
All sorts of household items were saved in the glory box, the idea being that it would ease the initial expense of setting up a new household. Inside you might find bed linen, towels, tablecloths, cutlery, and dishware. Often the young woman herself had carefully stitched the items for her glory box.
I didn’t have one – I was too busy trying to afford day-to-day expenses to put anything aside for the future!
But I did have a school friend from a Greek family, and by the time we were 16 she had quite a good stash. I loved visiting her and admiring the goodies in her glory box – crystal glassware, fine china, handmade doilies. Her friends and family were never stuck for gift ideas – if in doubt, they just gave her something for her glory box!
Whatever happened to Glory Boxes?
Glory boxes have definitely disappeared from our lives, for a multitude of reasons …
1. These days, young people move out of home long before they get married. Often young couples have too much stuff (rather than not enough), as they try to merge two households into one!
2. The rise of the credit card. Setting up home? Just flash your plastic!
3. Home decor styles are constantly changing – so what you collected 10 years ago, is not something you would want in your home now.
4. The major expenses these days are associated with electrical and white goods, and who wants to store them away for years?! First of all – because nobody has the room; and secondly, because the warranties would have expired by the time you actually got to use things!
5. We don’t tend to make our household linens etc anymore, so it doesn’t take us years to get things ready for our own home.
I love the romance of the old glory boxes, but Miss 17 already has so much stuff she doesn’t know where to put it all – and besides, it does seem a bit sexist in retrospect!
Did you or your friends have glory boxes?!