National Identity - Rebranding Character Jim Cadbury-Brown (1913 - 2009), a key figure in British modernism, designed two major pavilions at the Festival of Britain, the Land of Britain and People of Britain (see figures 3.10 & 3.11). These were located along the festival’s main esplanade, a route studded with runway landing lights and
Figure 3.12 Drawing of the initial design for the international exposition on the South Bank
‘flame fountains’ at the end.16 Through these, he explained, ‘you created a kind of identity with them’. 17 For festival organisers and designers, this focus on the landscape and identity of place did not suggest narrow-mindedness, engaged with reconstructing urban modernity. Instead they were setting the scene for people to reconnect with their damaged land, to help the public forget the harrowing experiences and the deprivations of warfare. They provided a glimpse of the time before war and industry had defaced the land, while showing a vision of a new fascinating future. At the time of the Great Exhibition of 1851 Britain was in a period of great 16. James Dunnet, Jim Cadbury-Brown was a key figure in British modernism, Architects’ Journal, Vol. 230, No. 3 (July 16, 2009) pp. 10 17. Richard Weight, Patriots - National Identity in Britain 1940-2000, (London: Macmillian, 2002) pp. 158
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