Tate by Tube is reportedly the best-selling poster in the London Transport Museum Shop.

A fantastic design created by David Booth in the late 80s.

It was commissioned in 1987 as part of “Art on The Underground,” a campaign set up the previous year to re-establish the London Transport poster tradition. David Booth, working at the agency Fine White line, created the witty adaptation of Harry Beck’s diagrammatic Underground map, first published in 1933. Each of the underground lines is represented by paint squeezed directly from a tube. At Pimlico, on the Victoria line, a paint tube stands in place of the Tate. This reinforces the sculptural quality of map and plays on the idea of travelling by “Tube.”

Info from the LtM blog.

Commenting on the idea, David said, “My ‘Old Faithful’ has always been a great door opener, conversation starter, (and job getter) and I’m proud and delighted its appeal has not dwindled over the years. The curator informed me that it had even been a major influence on a second, more recently commissioned poster, the Rorschach Test map by the artist Cornelia Parker.”

Quoted from 25 years down the tube, on David Booth’s blog.

The original artwork is displayed in the London Transport Museum, photographed below by yorkshirerambler on Flickr.

The poster’s also available on Amazon.co.uk for a snip at £5.49.

Slightly related, here are some iconic film posters by graphic designer Bill Gold (1921–2018).