In 1977, The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady was published, a book that was what it said on the tin: the 1906 nature notes of the art teacher Edith Holden, attractively repackaged. It was a hit, and for years afterwards other titles appeared using some variation or combination of country, diary, Edwardian and lady, decorated with imitations of Holden’s sweet sketches of flowers. There was also merchandise – tea towels, calendars, biscuit tins.
The architectural style of brutalism, which lasted roughly from the 1950s to the mid-70s, may never attract the same readership, but there is nonetheless a burgeoning industry, following brave celebrations of the style in the writings and broadcasts of Owen Hatherley and Jonathan Meades, of books that wield the B-word: Brutalism: Post-War British Architecture; This Brutal World; Space, Hope and Brutalism; Brutalism Resurgent; Concrete Concept: Brutalist Buildings Around the World. Also, the related Concretopia. There is a brutalist London map and you can buy notecards of brutalist London. As Barnabas Calder notes in his contribution to the genre, Raw Concrete: the Beauty of Brutalism, there are now plates, mugs, T-shirts and indeed tea towels that celebrate it.
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