London Underground - London Underground Design and the Arts/London Underground Map - K

London Underground - K

London Underground Design and the Arts

London Underground Map

Early maps of the Metropolitan and District railways were city maps with the lines superimposed, and the District published a pocket map in 1897. A Central London Railway route diagram appears on a 1904 postcard and 1905 poster, similar maps appearing in District Railway cars in 1908. In the same year, following a marketing agreement between the operators, a joint central area map that included all the lines was published. A new map was published in 1921 without any background details, but the central area was squashed, requiring smaller letters and arrows.

Although Fred H. Stingemore enlarged the central area of the map, it was Harry Beck who took this further by distorting geography and simplifying the map so that the railways appeared as straight lines with equally spaced stations. He presented his original draft in 1931, and after initial rejection it was first printed in 1933. Today's tube map is an evolution of that original design, and the ideas are used by many metro systems around the world.

The current standard tube map shows the Docklands Light Railway, London Overground, Emirates Air Line, London Tramlink and the London Underground, a more detailed map covering a larger area, published by National Rail and Transport for London, includes suburban railway services. The tube map came second in a BBC and London Transport Museum poll asking for a favourite UK design icon of the 20th century and the underground's 150th anniversary was celebrated by a Google Doodle on the search engine.

Commissioned by Art on the Underground, the cover of the pocket map is designed by various British and international artists, one of the largest public art commissions in the UK.

London Underground Roundel

While the first use of a roundel in a London transport context was the trademark of the London General Omnibus Company registered in 1905, it was first used on the Underground in 1908 when the UERL placed a solid red circle behind station nameboards on platforms to highlight the name. The word "UNDERGROUND" was placed in a roundel instead of a station name on posters in 1912 by Charles Sharland and Alfred France, as well as on undated and possibly earlier posters from the same period.

Frank Pick, impressed by the Paris Metro, thought the solid red disc cumbersome and took a version where the disc became a ring from a 1915 Sharland poster and gave it to Edward Johnston to develop, and registered the symbol as a trademark in 1917. The roundel was first printed on a map cover using the Johnston typeface in June 1919, and printed in colour the following October.

After the UERL was absorbed into the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933, it used forms of the roundel for buses, trams and coaches, as well as the Underground. The words "London Transport" were added inside the ring, above and below the bar. The Carr-Edwards report, published in 1938 as possibly the first attempt at a graphics standards manual, introduced stricter guidelines. Between 1948 and 1957 the word "Underground" in the bar was replaced by "London Transport".

As of 2013, forms of the roundel, with differing colours for the ring and bar, are used for other TfL services, such as London Buses, Tramlink, London Overground, London River Services and Docklands Light Railway. Crossrail will also be identified with a roundel. The 100th anniversary of the roundel was celebrated in 2008 by TfL commissioning 100 artists to produce works that celebrate the design. Roundels are featured outside many underground stations, they are commonly mounted on a white pole known as a "Venetian mast".

In 2016, Tate Modern commissioned conceptual artist Michael Craig-Martin to "reimagine" the roundel, changing its colours for the first time since the sign was introduced. His design was displayed at Southwark Station in collaboration with Art on the Underground to mark the opening weekend of the new Tate Modern gallery situated near the station.

London Underground Johnston Typeface

The first posters used various type fonts, as was contemporary practice, and station signs used sans serif block capitals. The Johnston typeface was developed in upper and lower case in 1916, and a complete set of blocks, marked Johnston Sans, was made by the printers the following year. A bold version of the capitals was developed by Johnston in 1929. The Met changed to a serif letterform for its signs in the 1920s, used on the stations rebuilt by Clark.

Johnston was adopted systemwide after the formation of the LPTB in 1933 and the LT wordmark was applied to locomotives and carriages. Johnston was redesigned, becoming New Johnston, for photo-typesetting in the early 1980s when Elichi Kono designed a range that included Light, Medium and Bold, each with its italic version. The typesetters P22 developed today's electronic version, sometimes called TfL Johnston, in 1997.

London Underground Posters and Patronage of the Arts

Early advertising posters used various letter fonts. Graphic posters first appeared in the 1890s, and it became possible to print colour images economically in the early 20th century. The Central London Railway used colour illustrations in their 1905 poster, and from 1908 the Underground Group, under Pick's direction, used images of country scenes, shopping and major events on posters to encourage use of the tube.

Pick found he was limited by the commercial artists the printers used, and so commissioned work from artists and designers such as Dora Batty, Edward McKnight Kauffer, the cartoonist George Morrow, Herry (Heather) Perry, Graham Sutherland, Charles Sharland and the sisters Anna and Doris Zinkeisen. According to Ruth Artmonsky, over 150 women artists were commissioned by Pick and latterly Christian Barman to design posters for London Underground, London Transport and London County Council Tramways.

The Johnston Sans letter font began appearing on posters from 1917. The Met, strongly independent, used images on timetables and on the cover of its Metro-land guide that promoted the country it served for the walker, visitor and later the house-hunter. By the time London Transport was formed in 1933 the UERL was considered a patron of the arts and over 1000 works were commissioned in the 1930s, such as the cartoon images of Charles Burton and Kauffer's later abstract cubist and surrealist images.

Harold Hutchison became London Transport publicity officer in 1947, after the Second World War and nationalisation, and introduced the "pair poster", where an image on a poster was paired with text on another. Numbers of commissions dropped, to eight a year in the 1950s and just four a year in the 1970s, with images from artists such Harry Stevens and Tom Eckersley.

Art on the Underground was launched in 2000 to revive London Underground as a patron of the arts. Today, commissions range from the pocket tube map cover, to temporary art pieces, to large scale permanent installations in stations. Major commissions by Art on the Underground in recent years have included Labyrinth by Turner prize winning artist Mark Wallinger to mark the 150th anniversary of the London Underground, "Diamonds and Circles" permanent works "in situ" by French artist Daniel Buren at Tottenham Court Road and "Beauty Immortality", a memorial to Frank Pick by Langlands & Bell at Piccadilly Circus.

Similarly since 1986, Poems on the Underground has commissioned poetry that is displayed in trains.

London Underground Overview

London Underground Locale: Greater London, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire

London Underground Transit Type: Rapid transit

London Underground Number of Lines: 11

London Underground Number of Stations: 272 served (262 owned)

London Underground Daily Ridership: 3.15 million (January 2023)

London Underground Annual Ridership: 1.026 billion (2022/2023)

London Underground Began Operation: 10 January 1863, 160 years ago

London Underground Operator(s): London Underground Limited

London Underground Reporting Marks: LT (National Rail)

London Underground System Length: 402 km (250 mi)

London Underground Track Gauge:

1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge (1863–pres.)

7 ft (2,134 mm) Brunel gauge (1863–1869)

London Underground Electrification: 630 V DC fourth rail

London Underground Average Speed: 33 km/h (21 mph)

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