Stylogeny combining Corporate Identity Modernism × London Transport Design

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Style combination · Contrasts

Corporate Identity Modernism × London Transport Design

The post-war corporate identity programmes kept the idea of one system across every touchpoint but swapped Johnston's humanist sans for neo-grotesques and the many commissioned artists for a standards manual; choose London Transport for a warm public voice, corporate modernism for neutral uniformity.

From the research on London Transport Design

Mix them and make something Corporate Identity Modernism London Transport Design

ATLASCorporate Identity × London Transport
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from London Transport Design, their arrangement from Corporate Identity Modernism, the finish from Corporate Identity Modernism. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

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What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Corporate Identity Modernism London Transport Design

Type from London Transport Design
Colour from Corporate Identity Modernism
Form from London Transport Design
Composition from Corporate Identity Modernism
Surface from Corporate Identity Modernism

02

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · London Transport Design

Atlas

Fira Sans, standing in for Edward Johnston's Underground sans (1916): two weights, ordinary and a capitals-only bold, with capitals on Roman square-capital proportions and diagonally set square dots on i and j; condensed letters followed for bus destination displays

Text · Corporate Identity Modernism

Modernist reduction applied to corporate communication. A company's whole public face (trademark, logotype, stationery, packaging, vehicles and signage) was unified by an abstract symbol, a single typeface and one colour, all policed by a graphic standards manual. Pioneered by Paul Rand, Chermayeff & Geismar, Unimark and Lippincott & Margulies, it made the reductive mark and the grid the visual language of multinational business and government.

Inter; Corporate Identity Modernism used Helvetica and Univers

03

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Corporate Identity Modernism, with a counter-accent from London Transport Design. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Corporate Identity Modernism London Transport Design

  • #ffffff ground · 36%
  • #111111 ink · 14%
  • #d7261e accent · 18%
  • #0a4fa0 accent · 14%
  • #d9a441 accent · 10%
  • #a4a9ad accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #ffffff;
  --ink: #111111;
  --accent-1: #d7261e;
  --accent-2: #0a4fa0;
  --accent-3: #d9a441;
  --accent-4: #a4a9ad;
  --font-display: "Fira Sans", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Inter", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

London Transport Design: The roundel is a registered trade mark of Transport for London, which licenses it: draw your own emblem rather than reproducing it. New Johnston, used exclusively by TfL, and its 2016 successor Johnston100, which TfL commissioned from Monotype, are TfL's corporate typefaces; Johnston's 1916 design has been out of copyright since 2015, and for the historic letter use P22 Underground, the revival the London Transport Museum licensed to P22, or another humanist sans, not TfL's fonts. Some commissions served empire, such as Bawden's poster for the 1924 British Empire Exhibition, which the V&A describes as imperial propaganda that included human displays; do not reuse that imagery as neutral nostalgia.

04

The two styles

A blue circle sits above two mirrored red tapered shapes separated by a widening white gap. Large, bold black lettering reading “Apex” appears underneath on a white background. 1955–1990 · North America, Western Europe, Global / networked Corporate Identity Modernism Modernist reduction applied to corporate communication. A company's whole public face (trademark, logotype, stationery, packaging, vehicles and signage) was unified by an abstract symbol, a single typeface and one colour, all policed by a graphic standards manual. Pioneered by Paul Rand, Chermayeff & Geismar, Unimark and Lippincott & Margulies, it made the reductive mark and the grid the visual language of multinational business and government. 1908–1966 · Western Europe London Transport Design The design programme Frank Pick built for London's Underground from 1908 and the London Passenger Transport Board (1933–40), continued by Harold Hutchison (1947–66). Fixed elements recurred across stations, notices and maps: Edward Johnston's humanist sans (1916), the red-ring-and-blue-bar roundel and Harry Beck's diagram (1933). Pick, an admirer of Morris and Lethaby, carried the craft ideal of 'fitness for purpose' into transport. Around those constants he commissioned lithographed posters from many artists, Kauffer, Bawden and Man Ray among them: varied art in one consistent system.

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More combinations

With Corporate Identity Modernism

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With London Transport Design

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