Homes Fit For Heros: Photographs by Bill Brandt 1939-1943

First edition of Homes Fit For Heros: Photographs by Bill Brandt 1939-1943. First impression. Medium format hardback in fine condition. 

About

Despite Bill Brandt's fame and considerable influence on the development of modern photography, the photographs in this book are a little known body of work.
The photographs were taken between 1939 and 1943 when Brandt worked on a commercial assignment for the Bournville Village Trust which was set up by George Cadbury in 1900 to manage the Bournville Estate, a model housing development which he created near his factory on the outskirts of Birmingham. The prints and negatives have been with BVT for some 60 years.
The photographs illustrate the living conditions in a range of housing types. For example, the back-to-back slums built in the nineteenth century through to modern municipal housing built in the 1930s. The majority of the photographs were taken in Birmingham but also some in London where he looked at 'old residential' properties near to his own home in Camden Hill. London was undoubtedly one of Brandt's favourite subjects and these photographs, taken around 1943, are amongst a much larger body of work Brandt shot in the capital city during the war-years.