Purple Patch

Our writer reflects on the season that denotes change and ponders its power for genuine metamorphosis.

A few days into spring, I looked at the rain outside my window and it occurred to me that we put a lot of performance pressure on the first days of the season. It’s as if we think they are capable of delivering the promise of both spring and summer – and should do so immediately. On the first of September, we flock to parks and beaches, expecting long warm days and temperate nights from here on in. Burdened this way, the first days of spring are almost always a disappointment. A few days later and the last blasts of winter show us what they can still do. At the same time, even momentary glimpses of spring have a pleasure attached to them – because spring means change.

One hundred years ago, in the spring of 1918, World War I was coming to an end. But for those in the trenches who could not possibly know this moment was so close, the war seemed to grind on without end. In simply trying to survive the impossible, many found comfort in dreaming of a new world, one that might better reflect them than the old world they knew. The Edwardian period, an affluent golden age that preceded World War I, was characterised by a magnificent design outpouring of some of the grandest and most exuberant works of all time. By 1918 the style had had its day. The world had changed. Edwardianism no longer represented the state of the world, let alone reflect the lives of those in the trenches.