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Going underground

85 years ago graphic designer Harry Beck created one of Britain’s most loved and respected design icons; The London Underground Tube Map.

The genius of his design was realising that, once underground, geographic references essentially became irrelevant and all that passengers really wanted to know was how to get from A to B and which station to change at. This turned an erratic mesh of coloured lines into a clear, linear structure—easy on the eye and on the brain. Simple.  Yet the concept actually gets even simpler. Because once you’re in the carriage your route is further untangled, illustrated by just one straight coloured line that is effortless to follow. This is ‘raw’ messaging at its best—everything deemed extraneous stripped away to leave nothing but one thread of information.

Nowadays we take the tube map for granted. The concept is so straightforward—so “obvious”—that it’s hard to imagine doing it in any other way. And yet why is it that, when faced with similarly complex information, we allow ourselves to wilt and regress to the ‘bad old ways’? Harry would not be pleased.

No matter what type of communication we’re dealing with, if we only ever address the issue at surface level it’s all too easy to include every caveat, lump, bump and deviation. We’re so afraid of not showing the whole picture that we only end up over complicating it.  And yes, business messages will often be complex, with multiple stakeholders, timescales and junctions. But we always have the opportunity to dig a little deeper—to “go underground”—researching the facts and stories, ruthlessly editing away surplus information that doesn’t add value, and planning a route to give us that one straight coloured line that is effortless to follow. 

Andy