Great Britain’s leading theatre designer from the early 1930s to the mid-1960s, Oliver Messel (1904-1978) won international acclaim for his lavish, painterly and poetic designs informed by period styles. His work spans ballet, drama, film, musical, opera and revue. Messel’s traditional style of theatre design became unfashionable from the mid-1960s onwards, and he increasingly concentrated on painting, interior and textile design, including designing luxury homes in the Caribbean.

Oliver Messel designed the sets and costumes for A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Old Vic Theatre in 1937. Director Tyrone Guthrie staged the play as a 19th century extravaganza, the music was by Mendelssohn and choreography by Ninette de Valois. Balletic fairies flew in front of painted flowers and Vivien Leigh’s Titania was, as one reviewer remarked, ‘like an exquisite picture from some Victorian lady’s keepsake’. Her Oberon, played by ballet dancer Robert Helpmann, resembled a stag beetle. The production was a huge success and revived the following year.