Penguin Books in the UK is having its 70th anniversary this year. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London, that wonderful museum of arts and design, is marking the anniversary with a display of about 500 of Penguin’s iconic book covers. It runs from 8th June to 13th November.

I have been drooling over this range of mugs that feature 31 of the classic Penguin book designs. I supposethey give me pleasure because they are familiar to me from my mother’s bookshelves when I was growing up. There are tea-towels, too. Is it deeply ironic or intentionally funny to have a Virginia Woolf ‘A Room of One’s Own tea-towel? And Arthur Ransome mugs are yet another temptation – just how cool would it be to have a ‘Swallows and Amazons’ mug?