Pop-Pa's Kodak Slides

When my grandparents moved out of their home of 40 years, Pop-Pa found a box of a few thousand of his Kodachrome and Ektachrome slides. I naïvely volunteered to scan them all. But, only a few months later, I had a record of much of his adult life and he had some wonderful memories to relive. Beyond that, I had a time capsule of design trends over a few decades—and this was particularly fascinating to study.

The design of the physical slides changed quite a bit over the years...but also stayed remarkably consistent. As a type nerd, I love zooming in on these and enjoying the little serifs of an old Copperplate and the widely-kerned Futura and Franklin Gothic.

Slide box design varies quite a bit for such a simple object. Some have lids that come off, others open like a clamshell. Some are plastic, many are paper, and the oldest are some sort of card/fiberboard. But one thing they all have in common: a reminder to also purchase prints from your local photo lab.