'Keep Calm - Red' - Large Magnetic Notice Board / Wall Art
Keep calm and carry on… whatever you carry on doing.
The 1939 poster that nobody saw at the time and everybody knows now, on 1.2 mm steel with a high gloss finish. Leave it as it was written, or add your own word at the end and make it about the person you are giving it to.
The 1939 poster on 1.2 mm steel. Leave it as it was written, or add your own word at the end.
Made from high quality 1.2 mm sheet steel with a high gloss paint finish, so it has the look of an old enamel sign without the rust.
High quality 1.2 mm sheet steel with a high gloss finish — the look of an old enamel sign without the rust.
It holds ordinary fridge magnets across the whole face and takes dry-wipe pen, so the poster earns its wall twice over.
Holds ordinary fridge magnets across the whole face and takes dry-wipe pen.
Supplied pre-drilled with fixings included, and screw caps to match. Made to order in Britain, in fully recyclable packaging.
Pre-drilled with fixings and matching screw caps included. Made to order in Britain.
Just like the original
The genuine 1939 poster, reproduced from the production artwork with nothing added. Order it as it is, in any of the eight colourways.
The genuine 1939 poster, reproduced from the production artwork with nothing added. Order it as it is, in any of the eight colourways.
Carry on whatever you like.
Add a word at the end and “carry on” moves onto a single line to make room for it. One word turns a famous poster into a present for a particular person — the baker, the gardener, the one who never stops knitting.
The genuine poster in four of the eight colourways, then personalised — one word at the end makes it a present for a particular person.
Make your board.
Live previewLeave the word empty and you get the genuine poster, reproduced from the production artwork. Type a word and the lettering re-stacks — “carry on” onto a single line, your word beneath it — using the same letters at the same proportions.
Made to order in Britain. Pre-drilled with fixings, caps and instructions in the box, in 3–5 working days.
Send it to someone before you decide.
Sends a link that opens this design.
Choose the pictures to send
Choose the pictures to save
Your words are shown on a photograph of the real board, so the shine, the shading and the rounded edges are as they will be on your wall. Switch to On the wall to see it at its true size in a room.
Photographs
Keep Calm And Carry On — Original poster — Barter Books — 17-Oct-2011
Printed in millions, displayed almost nowhere.
Printed in millions, displayed almost nowhere.
The poster was produced by the Ministry of Information in 1939, in the weeks before the war began, as the third in a set of three. The first two — “Freedom Is In Peril” and “Your Courage, Your Cheerfulness, Your Resolution Will Bring Us Victory” — went up around the country. This one was held back, to be issued only if Britain were invaded. It never was, and so the poster was never widely posted.
Around two and a half million copies were printed. Almost all were pulped for the paper. The design carried no illustration at all: the crown of King George VI at the top, and five words in a plain capital lettering drawn specially for the series, chosen because it was thought hard to counterfeit.
It stayed forgotten for sixty years. In 2000 a copy turned up in a box of books bought at auction by a second-hand bookshop in Alnwick, Northumberland, and was framed and hung by the till. Customers kept asking to buy it. The shop began printing copies, and within a decade the phrase was on mugs, tea towels and doormats across the world.
Being Crown copyright from 1939, the original design has long since passed into the public domain, which is why anyone may print it — and why so many have. What it was designed for, though, was steel and enamel’s job: one message, read across a room, in weather or in a hurry.
Produced by the Ministry of Information in 1939 and held back for an invasion that never came, so it was never generally issued. Around two and a half million copies were printed and almost all were pulped.
A surviving copy turned up in 2000 in a box of auctioned books at a bookshop in Alnwick. Customers kept asking to buy it, and within a decade the phrase was everywhere.
Eighty-seven years, in five lines.
The datesMade in my town.
The same steel, the same finish, the same two formats — with your town, county or country set in the lettering of an old enamel street sign. Eight colourways, and the same live preview before you order.
The same steel and the same two formats, with your town, county or country set in the lettering of an old enamel street sign.