The COI Collection Volume Two: Design for Today (2-DVD set)

The Central Office of Information (COI) was established in April 1946 as a successor to the wartime Ministry of Information. It went on to produce and distribute thousands of films for use across Britain, the Commonwealth and the world. Many famous faces have passed through the portals of the COI including luminaries of the British documentary movement such as Paul Rotha, Humphrey Jennings and Lindsay Anderson and in later years the likes of Hugh Hudson (Chariots of Fire) and Peter Greenaway (The Draughtsman’s Contract) who spent 15 years there. 

This second volume in the COI Collection surveys the subjects of architecture, design and fashion.

Highlights include:

• Designing Women (1948), Joyce Grenfell takes us through the dos and dont's of home furnishing
• Brief City (1952), modernist architecture and design on show at the Festival of Britain
• Design for Today (1965), Hugh Hudson's day-in-the-life of British design
• Insight: Terence Conran (1981) and Insight: Zandra Rhodes (1981), Peter Greenaway and Michael Nyman team up in an early collaboration 
• The Pacemakers – BIBA (1970) a look at the work of Barbara Hulanicki

This volume also boasts two newly commissioned scores by electronic pop band Saint Etienne. They give Designed in Britain (1959) and Design for Today (1965) a contemporary musical makeover, whilst still retaining some original features. An accompanying booklet provides authoritative notes, along with Hugh Hudson's recollections of making Design for Today.

Full contents:

Disc one

• Designing Women
• Designed in Britain
• Brief City
• Design for Today
• This Week in Britain 615: National Theatre
• The Pacemakers: Basil Spence
• Insight: Terence Conran

Disc two

• Sixty Years of Fashion
• Miniskirts Make Money
• The Pacemakers: Biba
• The Country Look
• This Week in Britain 750: Men's Fashion's; 24 Horas (24 Hours): Men's Fashions
• This Week in Britain 791: The Mary Quant Show
• This Week in Britain 1111: Savile Row
• Insight: Zandra Rhodes
• A Woman's Place: The Image Makers

• Fully illustrated booklet including comprehensive contextualising notes and essays from academics and film historians