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Historian and television presenter Dr Suzannah Lipscomb explores the time when British people embraced modern design for the first time after years of austerity and self-denial and introduces some preview clips from her forthcoming BBC programme.

The look and feel of the post-war 1950s home – a ‘modern’ world of moulded plywood furniture, fibreglass, plastics and polyester – had its roots in the materials innovations of World War Two. In fact, no other war before or since has had such a profound effect on the technologies of our current life.

This bright new era encompassed a host of social changes, including higher living standards and improved technologies but, as Lipscomb discovers, there were also unexpected dangers lurking throughout the changing home.

Lipscomb is an historian, author, broadcaster and award-winning academic at New College of the Humanities. Hidden Killers of the Post-War Home is the fifth in a series of ‘hidden killers’ programmes for BBC Four. Lipscomb is also author of The King is Dead: The Last Will and Testament of Henry VIII; 1536: The Year that Changed Henry VIII; and A Visitor’s Companion to Tudor England.

Here she talks to journalist and writer Lucy Atkins, author of the novels, The Missing One and The Other Child, and of a number of non-fiction books.

This event lasts one hour 15 minutes.

Writer, journalist, essayist and filmmaker Jonathan Meades introduces a preview showing of his forthcoming BBC documentary on Mussolini and the architecture of the Fascist era on Sunday.