A new book catalogues both the grand and inconspicuous icons of British design

""Thankfully, we all drifted towards the same enjoyable mix of items like toys, homeware and electronics - proof that great design sneaks into everyday life more often than we realise," says Hannah Neate, editor at the modernist. "Some slides are gloriously stuck in their era (if you can picture 70s orange plastic, you're already halfway there), while others are bona fide design classics. The end result is a wonderful blend of the sleek and the surprising.""

""When I was about ten years old, someone down the street from where I lived bought one of these tiny cars shortly after they were launched," says John. "I was enthralled by the futuristic quirkiness of this bright orange, wedge-shaped vehicle and even used some of my pocket money to buy a Corgi diecast model of the Bond Bug, which I still have to this day." John also points to another slide in the book, one that doesn't depict an object but instead the slide library itself. Taken in 1981, the image is infused with an on-brand sepia tint and shows a glut of beige filing cabinets. "It reminds me of the huge pleasure to be gained by physically browsing through analogue slide collections," says John, "and the joy of discovering all sorts of visual (but also tactile) treasures in the process.""

Members of Manchester Metropolitan University Special Collections and staff at the modernist each selected 40 favourites from a 22,000-slide archive to create a 100-item curated selection. Choices converged on toys, homeware and electronics, illustrating how notable design appears in ordinary objects. The images range from era-specific pieces with unmistakable period character to enduring design classics, producing a blend of sleek and surprising items. A former curator recalled childhood fascination with the 1970 Bond Bug and preserving a Corgi diecast model. A sepia-tinted slide of the slide library evokes the tactile pleasure of browsing analogue collections. A square design format was adopted to honour those tactile, physical origins.

Read at Itsnicethat