Drawings for New Johnston from 1979 at the London Transport Museum’s design exhibition room. Note the lowercase g.

That London Tube typeface? Look again

I can’t believe it’s not Johnston!

It’s a point of embarrassment to me that I only learned a few days ago one of the oddities to do with Johnston, the typeface used by Transport for London (TfL) since it was designed in 1916. TfL has had many names over the years — it was then known as “the Underground Group” — but the face has remained constant. It’s what you associate with…