Psychedelia is a term describing a category of music, visual art, fashion, and culture that is associated originally with the high 1960s, hippies, and the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco, California. It generally began in 1966, but truly took off in 1967 with the Summer of Love. Its beginnings are associated with San Francisco but the style soon spread across the U.S.A., and worldwide.
Psychedelia takes its name from psychedelic (mind manifesting) drugs, which assisted in fueling an entire subculture of fusing together different genres and mediums where strong boundries had previously existed.
The psychedelic subculture of the 1960s had a strong influence on the popular culture of the early 1970s, and is well recognized even by those who are naïve to its origins.
See also