What did Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert design?
Robert Miller
Published Feb 16, 2026
What did Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert design?
One of the most ambitious and effective information design projects ever executed in Britain is the road and motorway signage system designed by JOCK KINNEIR (1917-1994) and MARGARET CALVERT (1936-) from 1957 to 1967. At the time, Britain’s roads were littered with a plethora of signs commissioned by various bodies.
What is special about Margaret calverts designs?
Margaret Vivienne Calvert OBE RDI (born 1936) is a British typographer and graphic designer who, with colleague Jock Kinneir, designed many of the road signs used throughout the United Kingdom, Crown Dependencies, and British Overseas Territories, as well as the Transport font used on road signs, the Rail Alphabet font …
Why was Margaret Calvert asked to design the road signs?
Fifty artists and designers, from Terence Conran to Betty Jackson, have made their own signs – and Calvert herself is planning to pepper a sign with 50 bullet holes. The idea came to her after she heard that gangsters use them as target practice.
Who designed the street signs?
1. Ancient Rome. In one form or another, traffic signs have been in use since the time of the Roman Empire. Roads can be traced back to the Bronze Age, but the Romans took the idea and ran with it.
What did Jock Kinneir do?
Richard “Jock” Kinneir (11 February 1917 – 23 August 1994) was a British typographer and graphic designer who, with his colleague Margaret Calvert, designed many of the road signs used throughout the United Kingdom, Crown Dependencies, and British overseas territories.
How do jock Kinneir designs help people?
Kinneir and Calvert designed the Motorway and Transport typefaces to use on all signs. Both mix upper and lower-case letters which helps people recognise words faster than when they are written using only capital letters.
What is the name of the typeface created by Kinneir and Calvert?
Transport
Transport is a sans serif typeface first designed for road signs in the United Kingdom. It was created between 1957 and 1963 by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert as part of their work as designers for the Department of Transport’s Anderson and Worboys committees.
What did Margaret Calvert create?
The road signage system created by London designers Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert was launched and used on all British roads on 1 January 1965. Kinneir and Calvert designed the Motorway and Transport typefaces to use on all signs.
Who is Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert?
Which road signs did Margaret Calvert?
UK road signs – 1965 As part of the new road signage system, on the pictogram warning signs, Calvert would often base these on her own memories. The animal signs reminded Calvert of her relatives’ Warwickshire farm and the school children crossing sign was modelled on a photograph of herself as a child.
When was Jock Kinneir born?
February 11, 1917Jock Kinneir / Date of birth
Jock Kinneir was born at the Louise Margaret Hospital, Aldershot, Hampshire, on 11 February 1917, the son of Guy Kinneir (1892–1964), a second lieutenant in the Manchester regiment and an army doctor, and his wife, Helen Elizabeth Margaret, née Smith (1890/91–1956).
Where was Jock Kinneir born?
Hampshire, United KingdomJock Kinneir / Place of birth