“Keep Britain Tipsy,” 1962

An epidemic of bar slops and leftbehinds in the early 1960s sent the staff of the NOI scurrying to the drawing board of Christmas Mintz. The Hungarian draughstman and chess grandmaster was to contribute a string of striking designs, starting with this thrifty-and-thirsty poster.

A decade later, Mintz’s stylish graphics were themselves abandoned, like a flat quarter glass of Red Rodney on a formica bar top; fashion had shifted to a personality-fronted campaign. Thus the memorable black and white image of hellraising Rod Fivepole, tousle-toothed wildman of Lipstick Jazz, with its brazen message: “Leave a drink unfinished? You might as well cast a bedstead into a lake.”