Once we were Cool Britannia. But the country whose image Tony Blair tried to burnish around the globe as hip, happening, modern and motoring into the 21st century with a new vibrancy may have lost that edgy appeal.

“Brand Britain” is still a strong national identity with foreigners around the world, British business leaders here in Davos heard yesterday. However, rather than being the epitome of cool among countries as claimed by its former Prime Minister, Britain is seen by much of the world as ageing and dowdy, if still a wise old hand.

Sir Martin Sorrell, the advertising and branding guru who runs WPP, the vast advertising combine, painted a less than glitzy picture of international perceptions of the UK for captains of British industry gathered at a special lunch in the Swiss Alpine resort.

In a blow for the nation’s collective ego, Sir Martin told the assembled British boardroom chiefs that while “brand Britain” was still strong, stood out among nations, and was seen as “clever”, its image was tainted by various perceived shortcomings.

“It is slightly old, and slightly stuffy, a bit traditional, and a bit formal, and it is seen as slightly upper class,” he said, describing the findings of extensive polling carried out by his company’s researchers.

People abroad asked to encapsulate Britain’s style and identity as a person did not conjure up a picture of a youthful hipster or a stalwart bulldog Brit, but rather of an ageing “sage”, Sir Martin revealed. The country was seen as smart rather than sassy, and as ageing.

National hopes of capitalising on the burgeoning markets of China, India and the rest of Asia were dealt a further blow by Sir Martin’s diagnosis that although Britain’s international brand was particularly strong in English-speaking countries such as the United States, it was “not as strong in Asia and Latin America”.

The advertising magnate pressed his case for Britain to seize on the opportunity of hosting the 2012 Olympics to modernise and scrub up its standing on the world’s stage.

“London 2012 I think gives us an opportunity to shift the perception markedly,” Sir Martin argued. He saw “a unique opportunity over the next few years to move the reputation, to play down formality, and stress creativity and innovation”.

Sir Martin’s diagnosis of the various blights besetting the nation’s reputation also came as something of a setback to the rosy aspirations of David Miliband — which the Foreign Secretary had set out minutes earlier — to make Britain a global player to be reckoned with.

Mr Miliband said that he no longer believed that it was right for Britain to portray itself to the rest of the West and the world as “a bridge” between continental Europe and America.

Instead, the Foreign Secretary argued that the nation should mirror London’s success as a city in the first rank of the world’s capitals, and turn itself into a “global hub”.

London, Mr Miliband said, was already “the place where people, ideas and money meet in a unique way” seen nowhere else on the planet. Britain as a whole should now exploit its special advantages of a global language, a representative of universal values, and its place in the middle of a networked world to make itself the epicentre of much global activity, he argued. “We can be a global hub,” he said.

Explore World Economic Forum

• Davos 2007

Times Recommends

• Brown targets fat cats after nationalising banks
• US shares soar on global banking rescue
• Europe follows Brown to head off meltdown