Great British Railways livery: Alternative suggestions/variations

[Rab Smith]

Fair play to the Government for not wasting oodles of taxpayers cash employing a design firm.
I mean, if I can knock this design up in 2 minutes then anyone is a design consultant.
This has got a bit of everything for everybody

 

[Envoy]

This does not work due to the ‘choppy’ design going through the length of the train. They should have adapted the LNER design that ‘flows' the length of the train with the front emphasising speed. All they needed to do would be add a blue line - in one shade. I also don’t like the white ‘eye’ around the small side window on the cab. LNER do it much better with black around this small window.

In view of all these negative comments, I think they should go back to the drawing board.

 

[PLY2AYS]

Moderator note: Split from

Great British Railways - station identity and livery unveiling (09/12/25)

Message to staff today from Heidi Alexander: ‌In the meantime, I know there is also a lot of interest in what the railways will look like in the future. This includes your trains, stations, depots and more. ‌Tomorrow we will unveil the new visual identity for GBR at several major stations...

www.railforums.co.uk

I think this design would’ve been better for the 80x

Based off of the LNER Azuma of course.

(Pictures posted include AI edited mock ups of the LNER 80x Azuma livery, with an improvised GBR logo and majority blue livery where mostly white is present on current LNER trains)

 

[XCTurbostar]

That looks really good!

To be honest, if the white line with red lower ran across the while bodyside, it would look really smart.

 

[Bantamzen]

I think this design would’ve been better for the 80x

Based off of the LNER Azuma of course.

(Pictures posted include AI edited mock ups of the LNER 80x Azuma livery, with an improvised GBR logo and majority blue livery where mostly white is present on current LNER trains)

That's far better, maybe you should send that in to GBR?

 

[PLY2AYS]

That looks really good!

To be honest, if the white line with red lower ran across the while bodyside, it would look really smart.

That's far better, maybe you should send that in to GBR?

It literally took less than 2 minutes to create, and certainly screams ‘fewer chefs’.

(If anyone from the DfT is reading this; it’s not too late to redesign… and I won’t charge a penny. Consider it patriotic outsourcing)

Although I know there’s a fair few enthusiasts on here who will mock up some better designs than I can, and perhaps even make them Class specific.

 

[Northerngirl]

I think it should be regional colours like we have now, but have a swoopy front & rear (like the old emt/swt) in the colours of the flag

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 9 Dec 2025 ==

And it would be far cheaper because you're just putting a sticker on the front

 

[Mitchell Hurd]

That looks pretty much perfect ! Looks like the font used for 'LNER'. I love the dark blue which I think many rail enthusiasts know the blue locomotives back then!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Here's one suggestion that could work with the one they have - take the red/white flashing off the centre coaches and just keep the two tone blue? Stops it being overbranded.

Also remove the GBR from under the BR logo, the BR logo on its own is sufficient.

Also get rid of the white cab window, it looks terrible. A black surround would work better. For bonus points, add a black or charcoal window band on the whole set.

 

[Steddenm]

How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

 

[ScottGallagher]

View attachment 193556
(CR400AF-AZ in its regular Chinese livery, but with UK flag colours instead.)

How is this?

Thats very nice

 

[birchesgreen]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Thats pretty nice, pretty simple too.

 

[jessfdm]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Genuinely infinitely better imho.

As a proud "woke", I don't have an issue with the red white and blue at all - I just think that the way that GBR have used it is tacky - in the same way you'd see slapped on someone's van, or a tourist tat bowler hat.

This design shows that it's not the flag colours that the problem, it's instead the "hey look it's the flag! You like the flag right?! Ruuuuule Britannia.." look they've gone for

 

[PLY2AYS]

Here's one suggestion that could work with the one they have - take the red/white flashing off the centre coaches and just keep the two tone blue? Stops it being overbranded.

Also remove the GBR from under the BR logo, the BR logo on its own is sufficient.

Also get rid of the white cab window, it looks terrible. A black surround would work better. For bonus points, add a black or charcoal window band on the whole set.

Completely agree. Simplification of the body side would make it a much more palatable livery.
(I share the same opinion about the new Chiltern Mk5 livery)

 

[CryoraptorA303]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Something about the way the plain white is contrasted against the deep blue doors and the stripes looks really outdated to me. Maybe make the white a more graded Chiltern Grey and desaturate the blue doors a touch, and this would be perfect.

Overall, a much better design anyhow.

 

[John Luxton]

My view is its just a rehash of pre 1996 with old BR blue and some NSE thrown in. Nothing new or original infact it is awful

Would have been better to keep regional - why not keep LNER and GWR liveries?

Both are good and have strong regional identities.

Develop something new for London Midland and Southern with a bit of a nod to past heritage.

This was also a time to ditch the arrows of indecision and come up withe something new!

One of the 1964 proposals I have always liked was this one: could be applied either way round so Lion always faces front.

Railways are going to be boring again from a livery point of view.

 

[BeijingDave]

What else could we have as a national livery if not red, white and blue?

I wouldn't say no to British Racing Green, to be honest.

 

[StuBeeDoo]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Now that ^^^ I like. I like it a lot.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Respectfully, though, I think that looks very dated. The proposed new livery is a bit of a mess, but it looks very modern, and I like that.

 

[Leyland Bus]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Looks like a can of 90s Pepsi... (sorry! )

 

[AndrewP]

The easiest option would be to not rebrand at all but to have the logo for GBR (possibly the roundel they already have) added to existing liveries this retaining local identity.

Where real impact could be made would be by imposing consistent brand standards, e.g. all intercity services were the same as LNER

 

[JohnElliott]

What else could we have as a national livery if not red, white and blue?

I wouldn't say no to British Racing Green, to be honest.

Seconded. Particularly if the object is to save money on vinyls, just say 'Everything solid colour X, with doors in contrasting solid colour Y'

 

[HSTEd]

I think I would have preferred a simple all over colour, to be honest.

British racing green would have been nice, with a suitable contrasting door colour. Possibly a light green?

Or honestly that stripe thing Virgin did on their legacy stock.

 

[weeklycommuter]

View attachment 193557
How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

Could you please send this to the UK Department for Transport with the suggestion that they use this instead of their current proposed branding. This is infinitely better.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Could you please send this to the UK Department for Transport with the suggestion that they use this instead of their current proposed branding. This is infinitely better.

You can’t seriously think so. It’s like a relic from the late 80s.

 

[Royston Vasey]

You can’t seriously think so. It’s like a relic from the late 80s.

Also very reminiscent of the Russian Velaros!

 

[norbitonflyer]

View attachment 193557How about ssomething like that?

Image shows a Class 80x with a white bodyside and a red and blue horizontal line throughout with blue doors and a yellow nosecone created using Google Gemini AI.

I'm sure I've seena very similar livery to that somewhere before. Somewhere in Eastern Europe?

 

[Elecman]

Let Bessie Matthews have a go

 

[Pete_uk]

This livery looks AI generated. It’s just terrible that our beloved InterCity trains have to be defaced like this.

An example of a ' class 800 in red white and blue livery" I just did.
Needs some work but better than what was presented

Edit: see my avatar pic too

 

[jh64]

I put together a few variations (by hand with Pixelmator! No AI rubbish used) with the yellow nose panel changed to match the rest of the livery, and it looks far, far better with the dark blue or Hull Trains-style black, much like the Amtrak locomotive on the last page.