Festival Star
The Festival Star was the graphic symbol designed by Abram Games for the 1951 Festival of Britain.  Games was one of 12 artists invited to submit designs to the Arts Council and the Council of Industrial Design in 1948, and won the limited competition.  The brief requested a design reflecting a summer of gaiety and good looks
The logo (which Games called an emblem) uses the traditional red, white and blue colours of the Union Flag.  The main device incorporates a profile of Britannia's head, with crested helmet, on the north point of a four-pointed compass rose.  Games added a row of bunting flags to his first design concept when asked to make it more festive.  The anticlockwise halves of each compass point are coloured, with the clockwise halves white: the east and west points are red and white, and the north and south points (including Britannia's head) are blue and white. The figures 19 in blue and 51 in red appear in the lower left (SW) and right (SE) quadrants, with quarter circles of bunting below connecting the south compass point to the east and west points, with six flags either side of the south point and a pattern of four flags (white, red, white, blue) repeated three times.  A version used on official publications places the logo on a background quartered in a background colour and black, surrounded by four additional compass points.
The logo adorned many official publications and souvenirs including beer mats, paper napkins, egg cups, brass pokers and plastic cocktail sticks.  It was also used on village signs erected in every village in Bedfordshire by the county council.
Games also designed a London Transport poster for the exhibition, based on his logo, with the two-dimensional compass rose converted into a depiction of a three-dimensional structure with four points, resembling a signpost or weather vane, and Britannia's head replaced by the London Transport roundel.
The logo continues to see use today in advertisements concerning the South Bank area of London.
== Three-dimensional street hanging ==
A large, 40 feet (12 m) three-dimensional Festival Star was also made and hung over Northumberland Street, London as a focal point for the celebrations. The four-pointed star was made by Essex Aero from 763 square feet (70.9 m2) of lightweight magnesium sheeting, weighing in at only 1,790 pounds (810 kg).
== Further reading ==
A Symbol for the Festival: Abram Games and the Festival of Britain, Naomi Games, Capital Transport, London, 2011, ISBN 1-85414-345-X
http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/exhibits/festival/list_objects.asp?ob=&ob_s=undefined&pr=&pr_s=undefined&de=industrial%20design&de_s=any&num=10&firstob=31&sortby=3
https://web.archive.org/web/20110603085254/http://www.pallantbookshop.com/books/details/a_symbol_for_the_festival_abram_games_and_the_festival_of_britain
http://www.20thcenturylondon.org.uk/server.php?show=conObject.2598