Australian actress Naomi Watts has donned a red one-piece vintage swim suit to recreate an classic 1950s British Airways poster to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the airline flying to Australia.
The original 1956 poster features a short-haired blonde woman holding a yellow surfboard, waves crashing in the background, with the caption "Australia – fly there with BOAC and Qantas". The poster was used to entice tourists from Britons to fly to Australia for – then considered to be the 'exciting new country in the South Pacific' – for some sun, surf and fun. BOAC was an an acronym for British Overseas Airways Corporation, an earlier name British Airways.
The airline was originally Imperial Airways, before becoming BOAC and then BEA (British European Airways).
The modern interpretation of the poster, featuring all the original iconic elements, is a nod to the golden age of travel where going overseas was considered what the glamorous and wealthy would do.
Watts was selected to feature on the poster because of her link to Britain and Australia. The actress was born in Kent and at the age 14, immigrated to Australia with her family.
The first British Airways passenger flight took off from London to Brisbane on April 13, 1935. But it wasn't the long-haul flights modern air travellers are familiar with.
The trip took all up 12 days and a distance of 20,526 km, with stop-overs in cities including Baghdad, Delhi, Bangkok and Singapore.
The journey to Australia began with a flight to Paris, where passengers made a connecting overnight train trip to Brindisi, Italy. There passengers would resume their air journey to Australia. It was necessary to make a connecting train trip to Italy because political consideration prevented, then Imperial Airways, from flying over Italy.
The cost of this almost two-week long one-way trip would have cost air travellers then $376 (£195). In today's currency that would come to $23,470 (£12,158) - nearly double the price of return ticket in British Airways' luxurious first cabin today.
Watts is not the only Aussie to have lent her star status to an airline. Nicole Kidman is currently the face of Etihad Airways TV campaign featuring its new flagship Airbus A380.
