Welcome to the Sign Design Society
The Sign Design Society (SDS) is for anyone interested in information and graphic communication within buildings and public spaces, including:
- Wayfinding
- Interpretative graphics
- Brand and experiential/environmental graphics
- Statutory and health & safety signs
As well as raising the profile of our disciplines, we offer members a programme of events, resources and initiatives to help them:
- Keep up to date and improve their practice
- Find potential consultants, collaborators & employees
- Promote their work and capabilities
To join choose a membership plan that suits you and sign up!
Our events
Thursday, 26 February 2026 (1pm GMT / 2pm CET) We all know typography is essential in visual communication. But what makes successful typographic design go further than just relay a message, and ground the content in a voice, plant its feet in a specific place? City identities are too often outward-facing only, meaning they are […]
Interested in a membership?
News
2nd edition Sign design guide now available to buy!
The new edition of the guide continues to provide practical guidance to experts and non-specialists alike, based on both best practice in inclusive design and the latest research.
Third party events
In 1922, the young designer Jan Tschichold travelled to Offenbach to meet Rudolf Koch, the presiding genius of German “Schriftkunst” (lettering art) and designer of the finest Gothic typefaces. This was a key moment, revealing two competing views of letterforms in German culture, contrasting historicism with modernism, nationalism with universality, and expressionism as opposed to the machine aesthetic of the Constructivists. In the event, Tschichold turned away from Koch, looking instead to El Lissitzky, Kurt Schwitters, and László Moholy-Nagy, pioneers of the New Typography. In this talk, Paul Stirton will explore these debates of the 1920s and beyond, tracing the development of two opposing views of modernity in German culture.
Until the mid-fifteenth century books were normally written by hand. Then Johann Gutenberg developed a process for printing books using moveable type. The revolutionary new technique spread quickly from Germany to the rest of continental Europe. In 1476 William Caxton brought it to England. With printing came a transformation in how people read and communicated. See the first book in which Caxton was ever involved, one of the books he printed in England, and examples of later genres, typefaces and illustrations for which he paved the way.
Join us at our Postgraduate Open Evening for courses within our S School. Hosted in our Lethaby Gallery, you will have the opportunity to: Speak with course teams and current students; experience our student-led exhibition, A Common Thread; tour our King’s Cross campus and facilities; ask questions at our Application Advice Hub; and discover how postgraduate study at CSM can support your creative practice.
Cognitive scientist Héctor Mangas will discuss a lab-based experiment developed to empirically improve and test the distance-reading legibility of new typefaces, tested on visually impaired readers, while type designer Peter Biľak will discuss the overall approach to designing fonts for inclusivity and accessibility. The resulting typeface was just published and Typotheque now works with marginalized linguistic communities and native designers to address their needs and support digitally disadvantaged languages of the world.
In March 2024, a collaborative team of researchers from the University of Cambridge and Birmingham City University launched an AHRC-funded project entitled ‘Small Performances; investigating the typographic punches of John Baskerville through heritage science and practice based research’. Two years later, the team is back in Birmingham, taking an interlude from their work to present their research and findings so far. They would love you to come and see, hear, experience and celebrate their research, and to join them for afternoon tea and cakes.