British Museum

The British Museum

The decisive moment

The glass covered courtyard with the old Rotunda Reading Room at the heart of the British Museum is the largest glass covered space in Europe. 

All that glass lets in all that light. It’s lovely but it presents problems too. 

The quality of the light changes through the day: red or orange at sunrise, through blue tones during the day and back to red or orange at sunset. 

We designed red topped totum and banners to help visitors navigate the space. They would stand out brilliantly and be unmissable but we couldn’t find the shade of red that worked equally well no matter what time of day and quality of light was filling the space. 

And then, happily, the catering manager walked across the space in the perfect shade of red: ‘catering manager jeans red’ was the shade of red that belonged. Good spot.

If you’d like to read more about our work on The British Museum you can find it here.