Back when men still wore hats and four out of five doctors smoked Camels, Vancouver was the neon capital of North America. Not surprisingly, then, French scientist Georges Claude's most enduring invention was often found in our city's more styling abodes.

"Neon was a very functional part of many Vancouver houses in the '30s and '40s," says local heritage expert John Atkin. "Homes at that time had sort of a moderne interior design to them, which was an offshoot of art deco. As such, you'd have these interior walls that would curve out at the top, leaving a little cove where builders would run neon tubes. The beauty of it was that you could order up different colours-I know of one house that used a soft baby blue. When you turned the light on, it would become the dominant colour in the room."

Functional in more ways than one, neon was also used outside the home. "Across the city, it wasn't uncommon to see house addresses in neon, often in red, green, and blue," Atkin says. "Basically, that made the numbers stand out more."

All that started to change in the late '60s, when moderne and art deco fell out of favour, not just in Vancouver but across North America. "It was replaced by styles like knotty pine and French colonial, which don't really go that well with neon," Atkin says with a laugh.

As subsequent generations have developed an obsession with all things retro, neon has undergone a renaissance. Filmmakers like David Lynch understand its appeal; pivotal scenes in his movies often start with a close-up of a neon sign, from the Slow Club in Blue Velvet to Silencio in Mulholland Dr. to One-Eyed Jack's in Twin Peaks. And, three decades after a civic bylaw banned it from new commercial signs in Vancouver, it's definitely back on our city's streets. Neon has returned with a vengeance in the downtown core, reilluminating Granville Street, which was known as the Great White Way in the '30s and '40s. Whether you're talking the glowing signs outside the Commodore Ballroom or the Yale a few blocks down the street, neon is again a major part of the strip.

On the home front, neon has made a return as a funky lighting alternative that doubles as art. Going the bargain route, check out www.stack sandstacks.com/ for everything from pink flamingos (US$49.99) to a ready-for-happy-hour homage to the martini (US$79.99). Looking to re-create that roadhouse vibe in your basement games room? Nothing lights up a pool table like a vintage beer sign. If you enjoy the thrill of the hunt, head to antique row on Main Street, where a recent afternoon turned up a Labatt Blue sign for $175 at Marti's Antiques (4394 Main Street) and a three-colour Lite Beer gem for $250 at Bona-Wight Antiques (4405 Main Street). If one-stop shopping is more your thing, Jukebox Junction (7895 Kingsway) carries a wide selection of suds-related signs, ranging from $225 for brands like Stroh's to $525 for a considerably more elaborate Corona sign featuring a multihued parrot.

As true aficionados know, though, back in the day neon was about much more than beer and mass-produced flamingos-it was an art form.

"Vancouver really took to neon-the only place that had more of it was Shanghai," Atkin says. "You could go to a diner in the city, sit at a counter, and look up to see a ceiling all lit up with neon tulips and bubbles."

Those searching for one-of-a-kind neon pieces can start with a trip to Impact Illumination Ind. (2404 Main Street), where owner Bernd Stanke creates works inspired by his love of minimalism. Putting a different spin on the idea of a standing lamp, a straight 1.5-metre purple neon tube sticks out of a flowerpot filled with broken granite chunks. Elsewhere cherry-red and powder-blue rods are mounted in a simple frame of untreated, honey-blond wood. Stanke also sells stand-alone neon sticks in various sizes, which he hopes people will take home and use to create something original.

"A long time ago I realized why everyone is drawn to neon," he says in his tiny Main Street space. "As fantastic as the shapes can sometimes be, it's the light that attracts people. That's why I started making neon sticks. If people start with minimalism and then grow on it, they'll be surprised at what they can create. By getting them to figure out where to place these sticks, I'm asking them to be the artist."

If ultra-spare design isn't your thing, you could always commission something more elaborate and multicoloured from Vancouver artist 12 Midnite (midnite@telus.net). He's at work on a tribute to late Vancouver rockabilly legend Ray Condo during the Georgia Straight's visit to his East Side apartment. When the piece is completed, the words Ray Condo Forever will glow cobalt-blue around a crimson-red broken heart.

Midnite says simple original works start at around $300, noting that something like the Condo tribute would cost around $800, a price that covers three pieces of shaped glass, a transformer, and backing materials. The appeal of neon, he declares, is simple: like black-and-white movies in which the men all wear hats and everybody smokes, it takes us back to a less-complicated time.

"We all remember landmark signs from our childhoods," Midnite says. "In Vancouver, people remember the BowMac sign, they remember the sign from the old Aristocratic, or maybe the Ovaltine if they ever went there for lunch. Neon captures those memories and, if done correctly, gives a room a really beautiful light that, sadly, you don't often see these days."