Genius who put British road sign on the map
She's hailed as one of our greatest women - but few have heard of her. Now red the inspiring story of the...
Margaret Calvert has done more than any other living person to shape the face of Britain — and, in doing so, stopped a million marital arguments on journeys across the country. Yet you have probably never heard the name and only now is her amazing talent being recognised.
Sixty years ago, Calvert revolutionised the look of the humble road sign, a feature of everyday life so ubiquitous we barely notice it.
Before you wonder what is so remarkable about that, just consider the school sign showing a girl leading her little brother across the road. that wasn’t just designed by Calvert — she based the girl on herself.
the roadworks sign of a workman digging, jokingly likened to a man opening his umbrella? that, too, was designed by Calvert. the clear blue motorway signs and their equivalents on a-roads and country lanes? also Calvert’s.
Some of her signs were mocked by critics at first. the ‘uneven road’ sign’s two bumps were compared to actress Diana Dors’s breasts when it was unveiled, and snobs attacked her clear letters and symbols as ‘common’.
In fact, the only thing common about them was that they were — and still are — commonly understood by everyone. that is their magic and her unique, unmissable legacy.
the talented young typographer designed pictograms so stylish they have barely changed in six decades and are the envy of the world.
Despite their Britishness, the signs have even been adopted by other countries because they are universally understandable and safe. Compared with her designs, road signs abroad are often confusing and insubstantial.
Over the years her signs have saved thousands of lives, not to mention preventing thousands of wrong turns (and arguments).
For decades, Calvert continued designing in her studio in Islington, North london, with little recognition. But in 2016 she received the OBe — and this year she was nominated as one of the women of the century on radio 4’s today programme celebrating the centenary of votes for women (though she failed to make the final shortlist).
Calvert, born in South africa in 1936, but educated in london from the age of 14, was only 21 when she began the Herculean task of rebranding Britain’s road system.
She had just left Chelsea School of art, where she had been taught by a respected graphic designer called Jock Kinneir.
together, the pair got the job of designing the signs for Britain’s first motorway, the Preston By-pass, opened 60 years ago in 1958 by Prime Minister Harold Macmillan.
at the time, we were way behind the Continent in motorway development — the Italians and germans had been building impressive autostradas and autobahns since before the war.
the Preston By-pass was a mere eight-and-a-quarter miles long — a tiddler compared with european motorways. But Calvert and Kinneir’s signs were a revelation.
From the start, their creations were modern, clear and colourcoded, so you knew exactly what type of road you were on. that distinctive, uncluttered blue and white of the motorway sign was chosen to be prominent. But the sky blue was also a ‘recessive’ colour that didn’t clash with the surrounding countryside.
the white paint is reflective, while the blue background is not and at night appears black, making the words even clearer.
Calvert and Kinneir designed their own new typeface, or font, for the signs, later named ‘transport’. they also invented another — ‘Motorway’ — to be used for the route numbers (M1, M4, etc) on motorway signs.
they made the transport font curvier and softer than the brutal, modernist letters favoured by most countries in europe. they wanted their signs not just to be clear to drivers, but to be liked by them, too.
the signs also had to be easy to read at high speed. In 1958, the 70mph speed limit had yet to be imposed; Barbara Castle, as transport Minister, only formally introduced it in 1967.
roads were much more dangerous than today, with many more deaths and widespread drinkdriving. Sign clarity was vital.
the size and lettering of Calvert and Kinneir’s signs were rigorously tested to make sure they were readable, however recklessly anyone was driving.
In defiance of convention, the designers used upper and lower case letters rather than block capitals because capitals proved harder to read.
to test their signs, airmen were positioned on a platform at raF Benson airfield in Oxfordshire, with the signs placed on cars driving towards them. the airmen then announced at what point they could read the lettering. the shape and size of letters were tinkered with so they could be read at a safe distance.
as it happened, neither Calvert nor Kinneir could drive at the time — so they had to imagine themselves as drivers.
Calvert says: ‘You thought of everything from the standpoint of: “What if I am at the wheel, doing speeds of over 70mph?”’
Five years later, in 1963, the pair extended their designs beyond motorways to all British roads. Until then, local authorities had put up different road signs of their own choosing. the result had been a confusing mess, as drivers passing from one county to another would be greeted by completely new signage. Most road signs had a cluttered appearance and were impossible to read at distance.
When the Ministry of transport decided to standardise them, they turned to Kinneir and his young assistant — and in came the distinctive and memorable colourcoding that survives today.
On primary roads, they used white letters for place names and yellow road numbers on a green background. On secondary roads, they used black letters on a white background.
But it was in their pictures that Calvert and Kinneir really made their distinctive mark on Britain.
Many of them were based on Calvert’s childhood memories.
THe cow for the ‘farm animals crossing’ sign was based on Patience, a cow Calvert had seen on a relative’s farm in Warwickshire.
With many of her pictograms, she made the figures a little softer than their Continental equivalents. She took particular care over the ‘children crossing’ sign.
‘the first school sign was a torch, then a boy followed by a girl with a satchel — it looked a very snooty school,’ Calvert has said. ‘I wanted it to look more inclusive, so you couldn’t tell if it was comprehensive or private. and I wanted it to be more caring — so I made the girl lead the little boy. But it needed to have something urgent about it.’
She based the girl on a childhood photograph of herself, fattened up somewhat because she was so skinny — although in reality she didn’t have a little brother to lead by the hand. as for that workman’s sign, she wishes with hindsight she had made the spade more ‘shovel-like’ so it didn’t look like an umbrella, but still believes it passes muster.
Over the decades since Calvert and Kinneir’s designs were introduced there have been small changes, including the introduction of the brown signs used for heritage attractions.
Calvert still notices small errors in new signs when she drives across the country.
‘It has been a nightmare all my life,’ she has said. ‘I am plagued by the sloppiness of something not being done well — the spacing being wrong, for instance.’
Still, Margaret Calvert’s extraordinary effect on the look of Britain remains largely intact.
While practically everything else in the country has changed in appearance over the past 60 years, our road signs — incredibly — have not. Because they were perfect in the first place.