One Foot in the Past - Specials (1994)

In a special edition of the heritage series, Kirsty Wark invites viewers to nominate a post-war building to be saved for posterity. The best suggestions will be featured in a new season of the programme beginning in the summer.

Forty of Britain's wackiest modern buildings, recently recommended for listing by Stephen Dorrell , Secretary of State for National Heritage, are featured in tonight's programme. Kirsty Wark , assisted by Lucinda Lambton , Peter York , Loyd Grossman , Dan Cruickshank , Carolyn Steel and Gavin Stamp , takes a close look at seven of the most surprising entries on the list, including a wartime canteen, a palace of beans and the oddest signal box in the world.

The Victorian obsession with natural history shaped some of the most extraordinary buildings of the age. Beginning his journey in Darwin's study, historian Dan Cruickshank sets out to explore this untold story.

The first of tonight's three One Foot in the Past films looking at measures taken to repel a Nazi invasion of Britain. Kirsty Wark visits the remains of Suffolk's wartime coastal defences, and the rusting Maunsell sea forts in the Thames estuary.

In the second of tonight's One Foot in the Past programmes, Dan Cruickshank reveals the social divisions that were created by the government's initial failure to provide ordinary people with effective shelters during the Blitz.

Tonight's trilogy of One Foot in the Past features concludes with the story of what happened to the nation's art collection during the war. Dan Cruickshank reveals that as early as 1934 plans had been drawn up to stop the nation's art falling into Nazi hands.

In this One Foot in the Past special, people recall the impact of the Festival of Britain, and size up the Millennium Dome as it nears completion. Recollections from, among others, Terence Conran and Mary Quant accompany rare colour footage from the festival. With Kirsty Wark.