19 September 1949
United Nations World Conference where the ‘Protocol on Road Signs and Signals’ is devised.
These symbols, which Kinneir [and Calvert] could redraw but had to accept in essential respects, were a fundamental constituent of the redesign, and were – together with the new alphabet – a recognition of the facts of modern road transport, and of the need for an internationally intelligible sign system.1
Kinross, R. Blueprint, 1989 ↩︎
Behind the pace of Europe, particularly Germany’s Autobahns, the UK needs to start building motorways, and these require signage.
A 1967 symposium on Transportation Graphics at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, invited Jock Kinneir to present. We can now accompany the magazine Dot Zero’s publication on it with the original audio recording.
After seeing their work for Gatwick, Colin Anderson of P&O asks Jock to develop a suite of labels to be read by people of different languages and levels of literacy around the world.
Jock and Margaret drive down what is an empty Preston Bypass admiring the first set of full size signs in situ.
Through a conversation at a bus stop with one of the architects working on Gatwick Airport, Jock secured a project which was to define his practice.