# Festival of Britain 'Contemporary' Pattern (Lucienne Day and the Festival Pattern Group)

> The post-war British pattern language launched at the 1951 Festival of Britain. Lucienne Day's 'Calyx' for Heal's replaced the revived Victorian floral with spindly lines linking small cup and seedpod shapes, after Klee, Miró and Calder, while the Festival Pattern Group turned X-ray crystal-structure diagrams into wallpapers, dress fabrics and furnishings. Screen-printed in a few flat inks on olive, ochre or white grounds, it set the light 'Contemporary' look of British homes through the 1950s; in the 1960s Day turned to brighter colours and simpler forms.

- Period: 1951–1960
- Where: Western Europe
- Origin: London, 1951: the Festival of Britain, where Lucienne Day's 'Calyx' was shown in Robin Day's room in the Homes and Gardens Pavilion and printed by Heal's, and where the Council of Industrial Design's Festival Pattern Group furnished the Regatta Restaurant with patterns drawn from crystal-structure diagrams. Mark Hartland Thomas formed the group, bringing its manufacturers together in 1949, after a talk by Dorothy Hodgkin to the Society of Industrial Artists, taking up crystallographer Helen Megaw's 1946 suggestion that crystal-structure diagrams suit textile design
- Branch: Rational modernism
- Also known as: Contemporary style, Festival style, 1950s British Contemporary textiles, Festival Pattern Group
- Page: https://stylogeny.com/styles/festival-contemporary-pattern/

## How it works

- Draw the motif as wiry, spindly line that links small flat shapes, cups, dots and seedheads, rather than as a filled silhouette.
- Abstract the plant until stalk, calyx and seedhead read as marks, not as a botanical drawing.
- Scatter the motifs evenly in an all-over repeat with plenty of ground showing between them.
- Print in three or four flat screen inks, with black line and one bright accent on an olive, ochre, brown or white ground.
- Take ornament from science as well as nature: let a crystal-structure diagram or ball-and-stick lattice become the repeat.
- Keep the tone light and playful, a child-like sketch rather than a heavy period ornament.

## Its design choices

Defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

### Layout & composition
- [All-over field](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/all-over-field/) (defining)
- [Organic flow](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/organic-flow/) (occasional)
- [Dynamic asymmetry](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/dynamic-asymmetry/) (occasional)

### Space & hierarchy
- [Repetition & rhythm](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/repetition-and-rhythm/) (defining)
- [Measured density](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/measured-density/) (characteristic)
- [Flat hierarchy](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flat-hierarchy/) (characteristic)
- [Generous white space](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/generous-white-space/) (characteristic)

### Typography
- [Slab serif](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/slab-serif/) (occasional)
- [Condensed display](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/condensed-display/) (occasional)
- [Hand-lettering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/hand-lettering/) (occasional)

### Colour
- [Limited spot colours](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/limited-spot-colours/) (defining)
- [Flat fields](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flat-fields/) (defining)
- [Earth & mineral](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/earth-and-mineral/) (characteristic)
- [Light ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/light-ground/) (characteristic)
- [Dark ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/dark-ground/) (occasional)

### Form & shape
- [Biomorphic curves](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/biomorphic-curves/) (defining)
- [Non-representational](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/non-representational/) (defining)
- [Geometric primitives](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/geometric-primitives/) (characteristic)
- [Squiggles & confetti](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/squiggles-and-confetti/) (characteristic)
- [Stylised figuration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/stylised-figuration/) (occasional)

### Surface & texture
- [Flat](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flat/) (defining)
- [Painterly brushwork](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-brushwork/) (occasional)

### Ornament
- [Floral & vegetal](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/floral-and-vegetal/) (characteristic)
- [Geometric tessellation](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/geometric-tessellation/) (occasional)
- [Abundant decoration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/abundant-decoration/) (occasional)

### Imagery
- [Pattern & repeat](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pattern-and-repeat/) (defining)
- [Line illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/line-illustration/) (defining)
- [Diagram & data](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/diagram-and-data/) (characteristic)
- [Painterly illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-illustration/) (occasional)

### Medium & production
- [Textile & craft](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/textile-and-craft/) (defining)
- [Screen printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/screen-printing/) (defining)
- [Pen, brush & ink](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pen-brush-and-ink/) (characteristic)

### Tone & intent
- [Playful & witty](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/playful-and-witty/) (defining)
- [Utopian & idealistic](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/utopian-and-idealistic/) (characteristic)
- [Technological & futurist](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/technological-and-futurist/) (occasional)
- [Warm & approachable](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/warm-and-approachable/) (occasional)

Avoids: Naturalistic depiction, Ornament-free, Gradients, Illusion of depth, Straight photography, Gloss & highlights, Horror vacui, Fluorescent & neon

Palette: #6b6b3a, #e6cf3e, #d4532a, #1b1a17, #f1ece0, #c18f32

Typefaces: Festival display lettering used alongside the patterns (posters, catalogues, signs), not in the repeats: Festival Titling (Philip Boydell, 1951), condensed three-dimensional sans-serif capitals commissioned for the Festival of Britain's exhibition display, Festival display lettering used alongside the patterns, not in the repeats: bold sloping slab-serif lettering on the Royal Festival Hall and South Bank buildings, developed under a typography panel including Nicolete Gray, Charles Hasler and Gordon Cullen, partly after early 19th-century faces, The only lettering that belongs to the pattern itself: the designer's facsimile signature printed along the selvedge (e.g. 'Lucienne Day' on 'Provence', John Line & Sons, 1951)

Known for: Lucienne Day, 'Calyx', 1951, furnishing fabric hand screen-printed on linen by Heal's Wholesale & Export in lemon yellow, orangey-red and black on an olive ground (Wikipedia); shown at the Festival of Britain, Gold Medal at the Milan Triennale 1951; the design in watercolour, gouache and collage is V&A O85223; Lucienne Day for Heal's, 'Graphica' (1953), screen-printed cotton, black lines on an ochre ground; with 'Spectators', 'Linear' and 'Ticker Tape' awarded the Gran Premio at the Tenth Milan Triennale, 1954 (V&A O110353); Lucienne Day, 'Dandelion Clocks' (1953), 'Herb Antony' (1956) and 'Sequoia' (1959), furnishing fabrics for Heal's; Lucienne Day, 'Provence' wallpaper, hand screen print for John Line & Sons, 1951, lettered on the selvedge with her facsimile signature (V&A O228597); S. M. Slade for British Celanese, 'Afwillite 8.45', screen-printed spun rayon dress fabric, 1951, from Helen Megaw's crystallography model; shown in the Regatta Restaurant (Festival Pattern Group; V&A O69642); William J. Odell for John Line & Sons, wallpaper based on the crystal structure of afwillite, colour screenprint, white and yellow on a brown ground, 1951 (Festival Pattern Group; V&A O75789)

## Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

- Influenced by: [Surrealist Graphics](https://stylogeny.com/styles/surrealism.md) (1924–1960)
- Alike in its design choices: [Finnish Bold Print (Marimekko Modernism)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/finnish-bold-print.md) (1951–present), 74% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [minä perhonen (Hand-Drawn Textile Graphics, Akira Minagawa)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/mina-perhonen.md) (1995–present), 68% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Serizawa Katazome and Mingei Stencil-Dye Graphics](https://stylogeny.com/styles/serizawa-katazome.md) (1927–present), 58% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [10-gruppen (Tiogruppen) Printed Textiles](https://stylogeny.com/styles/tio-gruppen.md) (1970–2015), 58% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Kanga (Swahili Message Cloth)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/kanga.md) (1886–present), 55% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Nieuwe Kunst (Dutch Art Nouveau)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/nieuwe-kunst.md) (1892–1914), 54% alike

## Sources

- Victoria and Albert Museum, Lucienne Day, design for 'Calyx', 1951: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O85223/
- Victoria and Albert Museum, Lucienne Day, 'Graphica' furnishing fabric, Heal & Son, 1953: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O110353/
- Victoria and Albert Museum, Lucienne Day, 'Provence' wallpaper, John Line & Sons, 1951: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O228597/
- Victoria and Albert Museum, S. M. Slade, 'Afwillite 8.45' dress fabric, British Celanese, 1951: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O69642/
- Victoria and Albert Museum, William J. Odell, afwillite wallpaper, John Line & Sons, 1951: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O75789/
- Wikipedia, Lucienne Day: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucienne_Day
- Wikipedia, Festival of Britain: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festival_of_Britain
- Robin and Lucienne Day Foundation, Lucienne Day in the 1950s: https://robinandluciennedayfoundation.org/lives-and-designs/1950s/lucienne-day-br-1950s
- Lesley Jackson, From Atoms to Patterns: Crystal Structure Designs from the 1951 Festival of Britain (Richard Dennis, 2008), cited by the V&A

---

From Stylogeny (https://stylogeny.com/), an atlas of graphic-design styles by Van Riel Online Services. How it is made: https://stylogeny.com/about/. Cite as: Stylogeny, “Festival of Britain 'Contemporary' Pattern (Lucienne Day and the Festival Pattern Group)”, https://stylogeny.com/styles/festival-contemporary-pattern/