Rental Pineapple - by Jeffrey Rubel
It’s the mid-1600s in Britain, and you’re hosting a house party. You want to impress your guests, so for your table’s centerpiece, you rent a pineapple. Yes, you rent a fruit. You can’t eat it (it’s a rental after all), but by displaying the fruit on your table, you exude a sense of importance and class.
Today, pineapples are relatively affordable. I was in a supermarket over the weekend and could’ve bought one for $5. But in the 1600s, pineapples cost around $8,000 (in today’s dollars). So, for anyone outside of the aristocracy, a rental was the closest they could get to this hoity-toity fruit.
The pineapple first made its way to Europe at the turn of the sixteenth century with Christopher Columbus, who took a plant back to Spain after his travels. “The pineapple was previously unknown in the Old World, and [its] exotic appearance [was] enhanced by its golden crown, viewed as the symbolic manifestation of the divine right of king,” according to Cardiff University professor Lauren O’Hagan. The fruit earned the nickname “King Pine,” and it became a must-have accessory among European elites. Charles II of England even commissioned a portrait of himself being presented with a pineapple. (His dogs look jealous.)
The pineapple’s position as a status symbol was fueled by a simple biological fact: Pineapples can’t grow outside tropical climates. Thus, they were rare in chilly Britain because, first, it was very expensive to harvest pineapples in tropical regions and transport them to the Old World and, second, early attempts at growing pineapples in Europe often failed because the plant needed both heat and humidity (characteristics the UK climate lacks). The journey from the Caribbean islands to Europe often resulted in bruised, rotten fruit, but the wealthy didn’t care –– they were still desirable status symbols because of their rarity and royal shape. They were the Birkin bags of their day.
Efforts to grow pineapples on English soil began almost as soon as the fruit itself arrived in the UK. However, for many decades, these efforts bore no fruit. (Literally and figuratively.) Pineapples are sensitive to minor temperature changes, so the hothouses built for pineapple cultivation needed to not only stay hot and humid but also maintain a consistent heat and humidity. Too often, temperatures would fluctuate in the hothouse and the fruit would die, or perhaps even worse, due to poor ventilation, these hothouses would sometimes go up in flames. On top of all that, thieves would try and steal the valuable pineapples, so security guards were hired to guard the nurseries. The Gentleman’s Magazine of 1764 estimated that it cost over $30,000 (in today’s dollars) to build and operate a pineapple hothouse, and even after spending this, there was no guarantee of success. European pineapple cultivation was a slow, expensive, iterative process, and these efforts didn’t have much success until the 1700s, when gardeners figured out how to construct hot houses that used furnaces to maintain a constant heat and humidity while still venting smoke out of the structure.
Because of all the effort required to import and grow pineapples, people didn’t just cut up and eat something so valuable. Instead, they would display pineapples in their homes or, in some cases, carry them on walks.
While the aristocracy could afford to own their own pineapples (and invest in developing pineapple growing techniques), the middle class –– wanting to emulate the dinner parties of the rich –– would often rent pineapples as a sign of wealth and good taste. Even this, though, wasn’t cheap to do, so the pineapples would be passed from renter to renter, from party to party, over a few days until nature took its course and the fruit rotted away. It was a taste of the royal life, without the expense (and, for that matter, without the literal taste).
This premise of renting status symbols is alive and well today. Okay, maybe not with pineapples. But it certainly is with Rent The Runway… and with the tuxedo I just rented for a wedding.
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