The Box is a major cultural and heritage attraction and archive, which opened in Plymouth’s city centre in September 2020. Its collection, formally the South West Film and Television Archive (SWFTA), is the regional film archive for the South West of England, comprising the combined programme libraries of Westward Television and Television South West (TSW). It also includes a significant number of donated film collections dating back to the early 1890s.
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Ile de France entering Plymouth Sound
The SS Ile de France steams into Millbay Dock in Plymouth.
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Overview
The French ocean liner SS Ile de France arrives to weigh anchor at Plymouth's Millbay Dock on its return from New York to its homeport of Le Havre in Normandy France. One thousand two hundred and fifty-six guests set sail with a crew of eight hundred and thirty-three on the Art Deco ship comprising of First, Tourist and Third classes under Captain Jules Chabot.
The Ile de France was built in Saint-Nazaire for the French shipping company, Compagnie Generale Transatlantique known today as The French Line and launched on 14 March 1926. The liner was known for its luxury Art Deco interiors after the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes of Paris and its refrigeration, becoming the first ship to carry Brie cheese to the United States. In 1941 the Ile de France was converted into a British troop ship during the Second World War. The liner was back in service by 1949 with one less funnel and was sold for scrap to Japan in 1959 but not before starring as the SS Claridon in the 1960 disaster movie The Last Voyage where another funnel was lost.
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