Detail from Harry Beck’s 1951 Paris Metro map design (which was rejected by the city’s transport authorities). Source: London Transport Museum
Harry Beck: The Paris Connection:
The Royal Mail recently commemorated one of the UK’s greatest works of visual information design when Harry Beck’s London Underground diagram was included for the first time on a British postage stamp writes Mark Ovenden. The importance of Beck’s rectilinear, topologic 1933 diagram is widely recognised and praised by graphic designers. Many wonder why Beck never extended his ideas outside London. The answer is, he did – to the nearest major subway network to London: Paris.