Michael Portillo strikes out on another series of railway journeys, this time through Britain between the world wars, armed with his 1930s Bradshaw’s guide.\n\nHe begins with a tour of the Home Counties and beyond, starting in the city of dreaming spires, Oxford, where in 1921 women were awarded degrees for the first time. At Somerville College, Michael finds out about a pioneering crystallographer, Dorothy Hodgkin, the only British woman to win a Nobel prize for chemistry.\n\nSoaking up the glorious sights of the city, Michael is tempted by a fashion trend that reached its height during the interwar period: Oxford bags. At Walters & Co, founded in 1925, he finds just the ticket. \n\nAt Garsington Manor, on the outskirts of the city, Michael discovers the risqué activities of a social set centred on the house's owner, Lady Ottoline Morrell, and famous artists and writers of the Bloomsbury Group. Tales of bohemian behaviour, nude frolicking and revelry in the beautiful manorial gardens turned heads as Britain buckled down in the face of impending war with Germany.\n\nNext stop is Culham, en route for Abingdon, where from 1929 the iconic British sports car, the MG, was built. Michael hears about the origins of one of the nation’s best-loved marques and joins the proud owner of a 1938 MG VA for a spin.
Source: BBC 2
Series 15: 15. Northallerton To Chester-le-street
Michael Portillo confronts a detachment of Gurkhas, produces a fine heritage cheese and discovers a monster cracker that is key to making plastic, before ending his postwar jour ...
05-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 14. York To Skipton
Michael Portillo’s postwar exploration of Merseyside to Teesside finds him in York, a paradise for rail enthusiasts. In the company of some of the most famous locomotives ...
04-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 13. Lincoln To York
Michael Portillo’s postwar journey from Merseyside to Teesside resumes at Brayford Pool in Lincoln, where England’s oldest canal, the Fossdyke, meets the city of Lin ...
03-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 12. Derby To Nottingham
Michael Portillo reaches the jet age in the Derby suburb of Peartree, where he tours the engineering colossus Rolls-Royce. In Derby city centre, Michael is on the trail of littl ...
02-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 11. Liverpool To Uttoxeter
Michael Portillo twists and shouts through postwar Liverpool, arriving in the city where the 60s burst into life to find the strikingly contemporary concrete and glass Liverpool ...
01-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 10. Dundee To Loch Of The Lowes
Michael’s rail journey through postwar Scotland takes him over the River Tay to Dundee on the trail of Joseph McKenzie, the father of modern Scottish photography.\n\nIn Pe ...
29-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 9. Edinburgh To Queensferry
At the former Midlothian mining village of Newtongrange, Michael meets the son of a miner whose name loomed large in the disputes of the 1970s and 1980s, 'Red' Mick McGahey. On ...
28-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 8. Shawlands To Livingston
Michael Portillo continues his postwar Scottish railway adventure, this time from Glasgow to the capital, Edinburgh.\n\nAt Pollok Country Park in Glasgow, Michael joins a women& ...
27-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 7. Glasgow To Cumbernauld
At the home of Scottish football, Glasgow’s Hampden Park stadium, Michael admires the oldest football trophy in the world and hears how the 'passing game' was born there. ...
26-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 6. Loch Lomond To Kelvinbridge
Michael Portillo boards the West Highland Line to begin a railway journey across Scotland’s central belt, from the Arrochar Alps to the Loch of the Lowes. \n\nAt the head ...
25-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 9. Edinburgh To Queensferry
At the former Midlothian mining village of Newtongrange, Michael meets the son of a miner whose name loomed large in the disputes of the 1970s and 1980s, 'Red' Mick McGahey. On ...
28-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 8. Shawlands To Livingston
Michael Portillo continues his postwar Scottish railway adventure, this time from Glasgow to the capital, Edinburgh.\n\nAt Pollok Country Park in Glasgow, Michael joins a women& ...
27-03-2024
BBC 2
Series 13: 8. Hampstead To Islington
Michael’s Bradshaw’s-inspired rail tour of London continues in Hampstead, where shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War, a groundbreaking Jewish doctor f ...
30-05-2022
BBC 2
Series 15: 11. Liverpool To Uttoxeter
Michael Portillo twists and shouts through postwar Liverpool, arriving in the city where the 60s burst into life to find the strikingly contemporary concrete and glass Liverpool ...
01-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 15: 13. Lincoln To York
Michael Portillo’s postwar journey from Merseyside to Teesside resumes at Brayford Pool in Lincoln, where England’s oldest canal, the Fossdyke, meets the city of Lin ...
03-04-2024
BBC 2
Series 12: 8. Potters Bar To Cardington
Michael Portillo’s Bradshaw travels resume in leafy Hertfordshire, where he attempts a canoe slalom course at the Lee Valley White Water Centre, built for the London Olymp ...
06-11-2023
BBC 2
Series 5 - Ipswich To Chelmsford
Michael Portillo continues his journey from the east coast to the south coast beginning in the port of Ipswich, capital of the farming county of Suffolk.
17-09-2014
BBC 2
Series 3 - Windsor To Didcot
Michael Portillo visits a station fit for royalty in Windsor, and views an engineering triumph built by Brunel to span the Thames at Maidenhead.
13-10-2014
BBC 2
Series 13: 5. Herne Bay To Leeds Castle, Kent
Armed with his interwar copy of Bradshaw’s Guide to the Railways, Michael reaches the Kent seaside resort of Herne Bay, where he learns about a pioneering aviatrix who beg ...
30-12-2022
BBC 2