About Hospital Wayfinding 1970
A hospital that answers "where do I go" with paint before it answers with words. Duke's SEDO system cut the medical centre into eight colour zones in 1971 — signage, elevator cars and stairway doors all painted to match the zone they stood in.
The design lives in the room, not on a poster. Pale institutional green enamel, a guide stripe carried along the floor, and short uppercase grotesque with one arrow, sized for someone frightened and in a hurry.
- Origin
- North America — Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina; parallel UK NHS practice
- Era
- 1950s–1990s institutional practice; peak c. 1971 (Duke SEDO, March 1971)
- Key figures
- Harry Sherman · Faber Birren · Max Miedinger · Eduard Hoffmann
- Movements
- institutional colour engineering · International Typographic Style signage · environmental graphic design
Hospital Wayfinding 1970 design spec
Colors
Background
Surface
Primary
Secondary
Accent
Text
Typography
ArchivoHeadings
ArimoBody
Roboto MonoMono
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