A portion of the London Underground was recently uncovered during renovations at the Notting Hill gate tube station in London. Previously sealed off when escalators were installed, these charming posters dating from 1958-1959 were found still clinging to the walls of the station.
As a kid I often dreamed of being an archeologist (probably the result of too much Indiana Jones). How rad would it be to stumble upon a secret section of the London Underground full of cute-as-can-be mid century advertisements?!
These images are from Mike Ashworth, who is the ‘Design and Heritage Manager’ for London Underground. See some more on his Flickr account.
More info on the poster designs can be found over at Kuriositas.
(Images: London Underground)






Stanley Console by ...
molly---great discovery! thanks for sharing.
great posters. I'd love it if they reprinted these for the london transport museum shop.
super cool.
these are great! i would love a print of that Royal Blue travel poster.
wow. amazing. we live in notting hill and completely missed these.
I would totally buy prints of that elephant and the Total Home poster.
Ideal not Total, duh.
The "River Thames" poster is so cute!
I want a reprint of one these! So cool and would add a bit of spunk to my space.
This is really cool. I used to live in London and have fond memories of tube ads. (As, I suspect, only a long term tourist would!)
I can't believe that these survived in such relatively good shape considering the air quality down there.
Cool!
This gave me goosebumps! What a wonderful find.
how wonderful