This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items recently cataloged from the Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection.
Touted as Europe’s first dope magazine, Home Grown’s first publication was in 1977 and presented an “enlightened and informative, as well as entertaining, attitude to dope and related subjects – views and approaches not expressed by the popular press and other media.” The content of the magazine ranges from articles about drug legalization and arrests, poetry, comics, stories, photographs, book reviews, articles about growing pot, and much more, but what fascinates me the most are the advertisements found in the pages.
Portobello Road in London was apparently the place to purchase “Clothes to get high in!” Curious to know whether the shop still exists today I found a blog that revealed that the area around Portobello was quite famous for record shops. The Hindukush shop which sold Indian textiles was apparently open until 1988 when it became Vinyl Solution, a secondhand record store. The variety of headshops that are represented is also quite interesting. You have more esoteric ads, space-age ads, and of course who can resist a smoking leprechaun? Tokin’ & Tootin’ indeed!
You can find images of the covers of the first ten issues in Hollis. Home grown : Europe’s first dope magazine. London, England : Alchemy Publications, 1977-, is part of Widener’s collection.
Thanks to Alison Harris, Santo Domingo Project Manager, for contributing this post.