Clare Coulson on 50 years of the peace symbol

The designer behind the CND sign would be spinning in his grave - now half a century old, it is more often seen on catwalk models than protest marchers. Clare Coulson reports The British artist Gerald Holtom, creator of the CND sign, penned a solemn note to Hugh Brock, editor of Peace News, before its first public outing on a London peace march in 1958. "I was in despair," he wrote, explaining how the symbol came about. "Deep despair. I drew myself: the representative of an individual in despair, with hands palm outstretched outwards and downwards in the manner of Goya's peasant before the firing squad. I formalised the drawing into a line and put a circle round it." Holtom died in 1985. If he had been alive to see this month's Vogue or Tatler, he might have been surprised to see an advertisement for Tiffany & Co in which... [read full story]