Joe Caroff

The centenarian designer who created the 007 logo and classic film posters just wanted his art to be effervescent

- Patrick Kidd

Many reasons have been offered, some quite fanciful, for why Ian Fleming gave his secret agent the number 007.

A hotel room, a Kent bus route, an Admiralty filing system and the dialling code for Moscow (which didn't exist when Casino Royale was written) were all suggested. But one thing seems certain: if Fleming had called James Bond 006, Joe Caroff would have struggled to design as memorable a logo for the film series.

In 1962, David Chasman, marketing executive for United Artists, asked Caroff, a New York graphic designer, to create a publicity letterhead to promote a new thriller, Dr No. As Caroff sketched the numbers 007, he noticed that the seven resembled the handle of a pistol.

A few refinements later and he had created what would become one of the most recognised emblems in film history. It has appeared on 25 Bond films. Caroff received $300 for his work and his name has never been in the credits, although the producers did send him an Omega watch, of the kind Daniel Craig's Bond wears, for his 100th birthday.

Caroff, a modest man who anonymously designed some of cinema's most well-known posters, was not concerned. "I never made a big thing of it," he said in a documentary about his career in 2022. "It was a job, I wanted to get it done. I always met my deadlines." In the design industry, however, his name was respected and his 007 logo brought a lot of business.