Extensive captions point the reader to important features to be found in the plans, and an introduction covers the background to the design. HMS Birmingham was selected for the series because this famous interwar `Town' class cruiser is unusually well documented. Unusually, three separate sets of plans survive-as completed in 1937, as refitted in 1943, and as modernized in 1952-which allows this novel form of anatomy to cover the whole of the ship's long career.