BCD Mtg Jun23 Pears Display 1918 Annual Delectaland Advert DSC03989
An unusual, large, coloured advert from the 1918 Pears Annual for Delectaland, a food company. The prose underneath is pretty purple! It would make an interesting small jigsaw - especially if 3D-enhanced - but I have never seen one, vintage or otherwise.
I was interested in the firm and found this blog entry about Delectaland & their owners the Havilands - particularly the training and career of Ashley Haviland.
buttes-chaumont.blogspot.com/2021/06/delectaland-and-havi...
The text below the 1918 advert reads,
"The Spirit of Delectaland, where pure Foods come from. She is crowned with flowers, typifying Happiness; she scatters Fruits & Foods - the exquisite Foods made in Delectaland, Watford, she carries a big jar of honey, signifying Sweetness, and she moves in an atmosphere of Light, signifying Skilled Knowledge.
Happiness, Sweetness and Light characterize the conditions under which the Delecta Specialities are manufactured. Fine Air, exquisite and dainty cleanliness, free and happy - indeed the ideal arrangements for the workers - these distinguish the industrial activities of Delecta Works, Watford, where things are done as they should be done.
The Delectaland Foods are Boisseliers Bob-Bons, Delecta Chocolate, Vi-Cocoa and Freeman's Turtlekon, Glass Lemon, Custard and other Food Products. They are economical to use as well as appetizing and highly nourishing. Happiness, Sweetness and Light abide in the Homes where Delecta Foods are always used. See that "Made in Delectaland" is on Your Home Foods.
THE WATFORD MFG CO LTD. Boisseliers (Boy-sel-e-a) Chocolates, VI-Cocoa and Freeman's Food Products, DELECTALAND, WATFORD, Eng."
From the blog above: "There was a time when every town of a certain size would have its own brewery, lemonade factory, biscuit maker and confectionery producer. Watford was large enough to have most of these businesses - confectionery was represented by Delectaland. Judging by its publicity it was a business with its roots firmly planted in Fairyland in the belief that repeated exposure to diaphanous flutterings would develop a growing market for their exotically packaged sugary offerings. This ad is from 1919, less than 12 months after the end of the Great War during which the factory served the nation by turning out thousands of explosive shells. Eliminating the flavour of cordite from the Delecta range would have been a formidable task. The Chairman of the company was Gustavus Havinden, who, inspired by the example of Lord Leverhulme’s paternalistic philanthropy, made plans to build housing and welfare facilities for his workforce. Details of this scheme are hard to come by and it can be safely assumed that it didn’t amount to much. There are indications online that worker housing was built in Neston Road, North Watford but there’s nothing to confirm it.
Another reason for taking an interest in Mr. Havinden is his son Ashley, born in 1903 who would become one of the most versatile and influential designers in Britain. The family link also explains why the young Havinden spent 18 months absorbing the technical side of the printing industry while employed in various print works in Watford. This detailed understanding of the principles of typesetting, layout, photogravure and block making led to his first job at the newly established W S Crawford advertising agency where he would remain for his entire working life. ... Crawford gave him the chance to live and work in Germany where he came to appreciate the superior power of German graphic design and illustration under the influence of Modernism and the infant Bauhaus.
... Ashley had no inhibitions about exploring any aspect of the visual arts that engaged his interests and he happily tried his hand at textile and rug design, interior design, and abstract painting. Henry Moore, Ben Nicholson and John Piper were in his friendship group and he developed a keen interest in contemporary architecture to the extent that he moved his family into an apartment at Highpoint II, designed by Lubetkin in 1938. This placed him at the heart of the North London friends of European Modernism where he continued his tireless promotion of Modernist values, working with European emigrés such as Herbert Bayer, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and Walter Gropius and instrumental in organising Mondrian’s stay in London. All of which was accomplished in a deeply conservative visual culture in which the prevailing advertising setting was dominated by a blend of Merrie England and Imperial Victoriana with a dash of Regency Dandies plus Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh."
BCD Mtg Jun23 Pears Display 1918 Annual Delectaland Advert DSC03989
An unusual, large, coloured advert from the 1918 Pears Annual for Delectaland, a food company. The prose underneath is pretty purple! It would make an interesting small jigsaw - especially if 3D-enhanced - but I have never seen one, vintage or otherwise.
I was interested in the firm and found this blog entry about Delectaland & their owners the Havilands - particularly the training and career of Ashley Haviland.
buttes-chaumont.blogspot.com/2021/06/delectaland-and-havi...
The text below the 1918 advert reads,
"The Spirit of Delectaland, where pure Foods come from. She is crowned with flowers, typifying Happiness; she scatters Fruits & Foods - the exquisite Foods made in Delectaland, Watford, she carries a big jar of honey, signifying Sweetness, and she moves in an atmosphere of Light, signifying Skilled Knowledge.
Happiness, Sweetness and Light characterize the conditions under which the Delecta Specialities are manufactured. Fine Air, exquisite and dainty cleanliness, free and happy - indeed the ideal arrangements for the workers - these distinguish the industrial activities of Delecta Works, Watford, where things are done as they should be done.
The Delectaland Foods are Boisseliers Bob-Bons, Delecta Chocolate, Vi-Cocoa and Freeman's Turtlekon, Glass Lemon, Custard and other Food Products. They are economical to use as well as appetizing and highly nourishing. Happiness, Sweetness and Light abide in the Homes where Delecta Foods are always used. See that "Made in Delectaland" is on Your Home Foods.
THE WATFORD MFG CO LTD. Boisseliers (Boy-sel-e-a) Chocolates, VI-Cocoa and Freeman's Food Products, DELECTALAND, WATFORD, Eng."
From the blog above: "There was a time when every town of a certain size would have its own brewery, lemonade factory, biscuit maker and confectionery producer. Watford was large enough to have most of these businesses - confectionery was represented by Delectaland. Judging by its publicity it was a business with its roots firmly planted in Fairyland in the belief that repeated exposure to diaphanous flutterings would develop a growing market for their exotically packaged sugary offerings. This ad is from 1919, less than 12 months after the end of the Great War during which the factory served the nation by turning out thousands of explosive shells. Eliminating the flavour of cordite from the Delecta range would have been a formidable task. The Chairman of the company was Gustavus Havinden, who, inspired by the example of Lord Leverhulme’s paternalistic philanthropy, made plans to build housing and welfare facilities for his workforce. Details of this scheme are hard to come by and it can be safely assumed that it didn’t amount to much. There are indications online that worker housing was built in Neston Road, North Watford but there’s nothing to confirm it.
Another reason for taking an interest in Mr. Havinden is his son Ashley, born in 1903 who would become one of the most versatile and influential designers in Britain. The family link also explains why the young Havinden spent 18 months absorbing the technical side of the printing industry while employed in various print works in Watford. This detailed understanding of the principles of typesetting, layout, photogravure and block making led to his first job at the newly established W S Crawford advertising agency where he would remain for his entire working life. ... Crawford gave him the chance to live and work in Germany where he came to appreciate the superior power of German graphic design and illustration under the influence of Modernism and the infant Bauhaus.
... Ashley had no inhibitions about exploring any aspect of the visual arts that engaged his interests and he happily tried his hand at textile and rug design, interior design, and abstract painting. Henry Moore, Ben Nicholson and John Piper were in his friendship group and he developed a keen interest in contemporary architecture to the extent that he moved his family into an apartment at Highpoint II, designed by Lubetkin in 1938. This placed him at the heart of the North London friends of European Modernism where he continued his tireless promotion of Modernist values, working with European emigrés such as Herbert Bayer, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and Walter Gropius and instrumental in organising Mondrian’s stay in London. All of which was accomplished in a deeply conservative visual culture in which the prevailing advertising setting was dominated by a blend of Merrie England and Imperial Victoriana with a dash of Regency Dandies plus Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh."