Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Creating a separate thread for this as it's quite a big topic, potentially.
It's mentioned on the other thread that Peter Hendy wants to bring back what is to me a very dated design scheme - black on white signage, Rail Alphabet font (albeit a slightly tweaked version, but it still shouts 1980s) and the double arrow. The latter is clearly a very strong piece of branding and should be retained, however personally I think the version in a circle looks more modern.
Clearly "Great British Railways" does include a bit of "retro" in the manner than gWr does, for example. But do we really want to go back to that?
Personally I think we should get Best Impressions in, who did an absolutely superb piece of work for London Midland* in collaboration with David Whitley, managing to do a great job of "creating desire" for what was actually a very basic half-commuter, half-budget operation with some serious problems e.g. overcrowding. Stenning just seems to have this ability to make public transport look really good, which is what we sorely need.
Any other thoughts?
* I believe Stagecoach "beachball" was also his doing - an excellent scheme which still looks modern and makes "new Stagecoach" look like a cross between a school bus and a Fisher Price toy - any others?
It's mentioned on the other thread that Peter Hendy wants to bring back what is to me a very dated design scheme - black on white signage, Rail Alphabet font (albeit a slightly tweaked version, but it still shouts 1980s) and the double arrow. The latter is clearly a very strong piece of branding and should be retained, however personally I think the version in a circle looks more modern.
Clearly "Great British Railways" does include a bit of "retro" in the manner than gWr does, for example. But do we really want to go back to that?
Personally I think we should get Best Impressions in, who did an absolutely superb piece of work for London Midland* in collaboration with David Whitley, managing to do a great job of "creating desire" for what was actually a very basic half-commuter, half-budget operation with some serious problems e.g. overcrowding. Stenning just seems to have this ability to make public transport look really good, which is what we sorely need.
Any other thoughts?
* I believe Stagecoach "beachball" was also his doing - an excellent scheme which still looks modern and makes "new Stagecoach" look like a cross between a school bus and a Fisher Price toy - any others?