Swinging London is a catchall term applied to a variety of dynamic cultural trends in the United Kingdom (centred in London, as the dominant city) in the 1960s.-----------------------------------Much of the phenomenon was youth-orientated and emphasized the new and modern, and amounted to a cultural revolution in the United Kingdom. It was a period of optimism as well as hedonism, as was the sixties in much of the Western world. One of the catalysts was the recovery of the British economy and consumerism from the post World War II period of austerity and rationing which lasted through much of the 1950s. Journalist Christopher Booker, one of the founders of the satirical magazine, Private Eye, that helped to define the early to mid 60s in Britain, recalled (though not fondly) the "bewitching" character of the "Swinging Sixties": "there seemed to be no one standing outside the bubble, and observing just how odd and shallow and egocentric and even rather horrible it was"------------------------------The period of "Swinging London" notably includes the famous popular music of the period, when the United Kingdom dominated the international industry, but also fashion, photography, film, and the arts (pop art, etc.). Its most prominent symbols were perhaps The Beatles (see The Beatles' London), the literary character James Bond created by novelist Ian Fleming, the Mini-Cooper car (launched in 1959), and Mod fashions, such as the miniskirt, which stimulated the rise of fashionable shopping areas such as Carnaby Street and the King's Road, Chelsea. The British flag, the Union Jack, became a potent symbol, assisted by events such as England's home victory in the football World Cup of 1966.---------------------------------There was no clearly defined "end-point" as the concept of "Swinging London" became generally merged with perceptions of the mid to late sixties. However, in the sense that it is mostly understood, it probably lasted until about the "Summer of Love" of 1967, when musical trends and more Bohemian, "hippie" styles of fashion came to be more closley associated with the American West Coast city of San Francisco, the home of "flower power", than with London. In the UK the Beatles' album Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) was a sign of "moving on".