Britain Can Make It No. 12

Innovative British design meets stylish practicality in a crowd-pleasing exhibition of postwar goods at London's Victoria & Albert Museum.

It's easy to see why a war- and ration-weary British public turned out in droves to view an exhibition of innovative British design. The show, held at London's V&A Museum in Autumn 1946, showcased stunning displays of industrial and household goods - the highlight, being a series of furnished rooms, including a 'worker's' bedroom and a top-end luxury bathroom with sun-ray couch on the side.

Britain Can Make It was a series of monthly magazine programmes, commissioned by the government's Board of Trade in 1946, to boost Britain's standing in the worldwide postwar market-place. This episode, the twelfth in the series, is unusual in that it focuses on a single story (rather than the customary 3). Coincidentally, and rather confusingly, the exhibition and film series shared the same title. This government film is a public record, preserved and presented by the BFI National Archive on behalf of The National Archives, home to more than 1,000 years of British history.