Recession Calendar a Huge Hit

A calendar depicting the wreckage of the past year’s recession on different regions of Britain is a surprise hit, reports the UK’s Telegraph.

The calendar features a different photo for each month of the year showing an aspect of the country’s economic decline and credit crunch, including boarded-up businesses, shuttered pubs and closed cafes.

"I think it will appeal to anyone with a sense of humor,” the calendar’s creator Kevin Beresford, 57, told the Telegraph. Beresford said it encourages people to laugh in the face of adversity. "Every year you see the same calendars on the shelves, such as Jordan and Cliff Richard, so I decided to come up with something totally unique."

Beresford told the Telegraph the project was inspired by the World War II spirit that allowed the Brits to go on singing by the piano in pubs while bombs fell all around them.

The calendar’s cover features a Woolworths with missing windows exposing the store's empty innards. May shows the visitor’s entrance at Dartmoor Prison with the caption, “Her Majesty’s Prison Service is the fastest growing industry in Britain today.”

November's image is a closed down public convenience on Tower Bridge Road in London, being promoted by Southwark Council as a business opportunity for a new restaurant.

Other examples include the Grimsby Docks, a printers off the Old Kent Road in London, which is covered with graffiti and a ramshackle hut.

For Beresford at least the project is not only a way to laugh at adversity but to profit from it.

Photo (not from calendar) courtesy of timetrax23 via Flickr.