The Bomber Babes

Clothing & FashionOwner Verified

About

The Bomber Babes at 1106 Second Street in Encinitas's Old Encinitas district sells reproduction merchandise printed from original 1951 Kodachrome photographs of B-29 Superfortress bomber nose art shot during the Korean War. USAF 56th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron crew member John Edmondson captured the source photographs using a Nikon S 35mm camera on the tarmac of Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa, Japan — a mid-century military archive that resonates with the vintage vinyl and analog-era collectibles at Lou's Records on North Coast Highway 101. Unlike AI-generated or artist-interpreted nose-art reproductions, the product line uses unaltered photographic source material from Edmondson's original Kodachrome color transparencies, printing them onto apparel, hats, and accessories. Operated through the Xcorps Action Sports Music TV production company, the brand occupies a mixed-use building one block from Swami's Beach on the same Second Street corridor where vintage and specialty retailers like Coast Highway Trading serve the 101 collector market. The highest-fidelity editions reproduce the 35mm transparencies at drum-scan resolution exceeding 4,000 DPI, preserving the original 1951 emulsion's color density and grain structure on archival pigment-ink substrates rated for 75-year fade resistance.