New passport designed to reflect “Creative United Kingdom”

The article “New passport designed to reflect ‘Creative United Kingdom’,” by Tom Banks of Design Weekly, looks at the people on the new passport.

Two women chosen for passport design

As the article explains, every five years, the British passport is renewed with a fresh design. Each iteration focuses on different events and people. The 2015 iteration was the first British passport to feature two women on the internal pages. Mathematician Ada Lovelace, and architect Elisabeth Whitworth Scott, were chosen for contributions to their field.

Elisabeth’s page featured an image of her, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, the Bournemouth Pier Theatre and a map of Bournemouth. This was the only page in the new passport with a female-only lead, because Ada’s page also featured Charles Babbage, who is credited with inventing the first mechanical computer.

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott also features on the new passport. He has his own page with Liverpool Cathedral, Battersea Power Station and the K2 telephone box.

An intricate and technical design process

The security section of the article also makes for an interesting read.

The internal pages of the 2015 passport were watermarked and designed to react with UV and infrared light - a design feature which cuts out 90 per cent of forgeries. William Shakespeare appears on every page as a watermark, which is testament to his importance in British history. Each passport takes several hours to manufacture.

To find out more about the new British passport and the people on it, we invite you to read the original article on Design Weekly.