Setting up a hair salon in a former church is unexpected. Add a chandelier of at least 20 disco balls? This is a good time, says Yoshi Burke, owner of the salon.
Burke opened the aptly named Disco Salon in Atlanta’s Grant Park neighborhood in March, and although the space is framed by stained-glass windows, it’s impossible not to stare at the massive onion statue that’s tied with industrial chain and pressed metal laces.
“I love him,” Burke said. “The sun rises on the side, moves and lights up these two beautifully stained glass windows, it hits this structure and the light spreads everywhere.”
There is a disco ball revival. Transformed into comic party decor or retro bars, disco balls for wedding decorations and home decor videos from TikTok and homeware stores can now be found high (like Kelly Wearstler’s melting sculptures) and low (like planters on Etsy).
And where there’s a trend, there’s the emoji: a disco ball version was released by Apple in March.
Libby Rasmussen, a Director of Social Media and Marketing who lives in Washington, DC, has always been fond of disco balls. Pictures of them perched on the windowsill of her house will catch the attention of her Instagram followers and often answer questions about where they can buy disco balls.
“One day during the pandemic, I was like, ‘Maybe I should start selling them,'” Rasmussen said. I contracted with a wholesaler and set up LivingColorful Etsy where they offer five sizes of disco balls (the largest being “The Grace” at 24 inches).
“The first day I opened an Etsy store, I received 40 orders,” Rasmussen said. “And then there were 400 requests. And then there were two thousand. So I really jumped into something crazy. It was really, I guess, the right place and the right time.”
Rasmussen said she sold about 5,000 disco balls within a year, and the business is still thriving.
Interest doesn’t seem to be slowing down. According to Etsy, searches for “disco ball” have increased nearly 400% over the past three months, compared to the same time period last year.
Although disco balls are associated with the 70s, they actually go way back. According to Matthew Yokobowski, Senior Curator of Costumes at the Brooklyn Museum, mirror balls were used in nightclubs in the 1920s.
“It was an inexpensive way to create a lot of ambiance,” said Yokobusky, who curated Studio 54: Night Magic, which ran in 2020. “You have a disco ball, and you shine a light on it, and suddenly the whole room is covered in dots of light that move. So you get a lot of bang for your buck for your little disco ball.”
Yokobusky said disco balls were used in the 1970s by underground black and gay clubs that didn’t necessarily have the money for high-tech lighting. Balls allowed them to decorate on a budget, and as disco music became more popular, so did the disco ball.
For some, disco balls are inseparable from the gay nightlife. “Being in a queer community, disco balls have always kind of been part of that culture, part of nightlife, tucked inside our apartments, dangling from our windows, and sitting in the soil of our house plants,” said Sophie Peoples, an artist from Oakland, California. “LGBT people are often kind of creative paving the way for what’s on trend, and sometimes it just takes everyone a little bit longer to catch up.”
Peoples, who uses gender-neutral pronouns, is a graphic designer and prop designer by trade, and they started selling fruit-shaped disco balls at their Etsy store, called GoodDoggie, last year. They said, “What I think is so special about disco balls is that they kind of have this life that you can’t recreate any other way.”
Creating joy at home led Kristen Opiamalo, a communications specialist by day and musician by night, to purchase two disco balls for her apartment in Brooklyn, New York. She works from home and her disco balls usually catch the light around 4 p.m., with her work day over.
“It definitely gives me a boost of energy to be like, ‘Oh yeah, the sun is out. everything is OK. “All is well,” said Upiamalo. “It gives me a little euphoria.”
Disco ball fans also suspect that the resurgence of pop culture, fashion, and music in the 1970s led to this moment. “I think there are other cultural shifts underway that are also playing a role in the resurgence of 1970s design,” said Kate Regev, an architect and historian at the Zubatkin Owner Representative in New York.
“There is a decadence and abundance in shapes and materials – shiny metals like copper and chrome, bright patterns and bold hues like avocado orange and green – that speak to people today’s interest in moving away from the cozy, homey, cozy spaces we’ve been longing for during the heat of the pandemic.”
“I think people are looking for ways to celebrate again,” Yokobuski said. “They are looking for moments of joy.”
And sometimes, conjuring joy is as simple as highlighting a mirror-tiled ball.
