Features
Explore design supremo Frank Pick's vision of the London Underground and see how the Tube was copied abroad. We also reveal the stations that didn't go the distance...
Design Supremo Frank Pick
From 1908 until 1940, every aspect of design used by the London Underground was overseen by one man: Frank Pick. He took a passionate interest in design, and commissioned the best artists, architects and designers to work for him.
The World's Underground Systems
The Metropolitan Railway in London is recognised as the world’s first true underground railway system, opening in 1863. It wasn’t the first railway tunnel (that was built on Long Island, New York, in 1850), but it was the first subterranean rail network, with separate stations, ever to be constructed. The innovation was one that was soon copied elsewhere, in Europe and America, and every new network that was built had its own distinctive character.
"Ghost" Tube Stations
The map of the London Underground is so iconic that it is hard to remember that its details haven't remained fixed – over time, many of the elements of the system it represents have changed. But it isn't only the addition of new lines that has altered Harry Beck's famous map; the disappearance of individual stations mean many of its characteristic "notches" have also been erased. The official estimate is that there are 35 abandoned stations on the system.
