![Some L.N.E.R. posters ; illustrated catalogue : London & North Eastern Railway : nd [c.1930] Whitby, Hamburg via Grimsby and The East Coast](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/53111255191_c09a164070_m.jpg)
Many, if not all of the major railways, produced colourful and artisitic posters to 'sell' various destinations and services to the travelling public. Following the creation of the "Big Four" grouped railways in the UK in 1924 one in particular made an early and concious decision to set high standards for their advertising and publicity, including posters. To this end the London & North Eastern Railway had a 'stable' of well known poster artists that they paid an annual retainer to and, alongside this established group, they regularly commissioned other designers and artists to produce pictorial posters.
The other railways were no laggards, although the GWR was probably the most conservative as had been the LMSR in their earlier years when various worthy RA artists produced a series of posters in 'traditional' style. One thing that is interesting during the 1920s is seeing the swing towards more modern style of poster designs and artists working more in an 'abstract' style and of all transport undertakings, arguably, what was to be London Transport took the lead here. That said the LNER were increasingly happy, or more assured, to start to commission more contemporary styles as the work of Tom Purvis here shows.
This small but wonderfully illustrated catalogue is not dated but is unlikely to be later than say 1930 and it shows that the company were enthusiastically selling copies of their posters to the general public; Double Royals for 2/6d, Quad Royals of 5/- with special prices for school purposes of 1/9d and 3/- resepctively. The Underground Group (later London Transport) had a poster sales shop. They show a wonderful range of posters of destinations within the LNER operating territory and Continental destinations available by the company's steamer services from Hull and Harwich. There is even one of the cheeky Herrick posters advertising advertising space! The covers show two small cartouche of an artist at work and of a bill poster at his trade. I wonder if these don't show John Hassall's work?
Three posters here; two Double Royals and one Quad Royal. The dominant poster here is Tom Purvis's famous East Coast in his typical style and showing the more contemporary style in graphic design. The poster of Whitby Cliffs in Yorkshire by Spencer Pryseis also typical of his style. Frank Newbould shows a wonderfully Hanseatic view of the old port of Hamburg in Germany, travelling via Grimsby.
