The poet John Betjeman stands on the South Bank, site of the 1951 Festival of Britain, and reminisces about his fascination with the architecture of exhibitions, and how sad it is that what seemed so exciting and new rusts and decays so quickly.
He visits the National Film Theatre to watch a montage of archive films of fairgrounds, circuses and exhibitions, including Barnum & Bailey's Circus and a boxing horse on Hampstead Heath.
The first national fair in the world was the Crystal Palace, originally in Hyde Park, then re-erected in Sydenham, South London, the first great pre-fab in the world. Its promoters hoped to instruct its visitors in the arts, with each room decorated in different styles and music resounding through the glass-covered arches. But it burned down in 1936.
North London's response was the Alexandra Palace, boasting fireworks and the first great airships, with views of the palace taken from a balloon. Ketelbey's Shilling Concerts added a note of musical exotica, but in 1914 the People's Palace became a military hospital, even down to the roller-skating rink and the puppet theatre. The palace is still in use, referred to as the Lung of North London, protected by an English lady sphinx.
During the reign of Edward VII, the Franco-British exhibition of 1908 was held at White City, transforming part of West London into a Venetian network of canals which, Betjeman remembers, smelt of chlorine. Similarly, Wembley in 1924 transformed part of North-West London into a dream of empire in concrete, while the 1951 Festival of Britain was calculatedly light-hearted, representing a worried government breaking into mirth.
The picture palaces were inspired by the fairground style, and can still be seen in the super-cinemas of the suburbs, with their decor and architecture creating a similarly exotic impression, enhanced by live performers who transform Finsbury Park into the gardens of Seville, while collages of images recall the great stars of the past.
At the foot of Sydenham Hill, a monument to the original exhibition of the 1860s can still be found in the form of giant replica dinosaurs, reflecting the Victorians' fascination with science and Darwin's ideas. Wembley, though, is desolate, the venue of the 1924 exhibition overgrown with branches and weeds. Revisiting Alexandra Palace, Betjeman recalls a song by Gracie Fields that he heard performed there in the 1930s.
Finally, Betjeman goes to the site of the old Crystal Palace, to find that while it has been reduced to just a handful of statues and overgrown steps and that there is little sign of the original exhibition, the BBC transmitter that has grown up in its place offers the British public a similar opportunity to see their dreams brought to life.
