Stanley Clark Meston designed the 1950s McDonald's restaurant buildings that featured the Golden Arches.
Meston worked with Richard and Maurice McDonald on the restaurant design associated with their Speedee Service System. The buildings used a distinctive red-and-white form, prominent kitchen visibility, and tall yellow arches that made the restaurants easy to identify from the road.
Those arches were originally physical architectural elements rather than the corporate logo seen today. Their visual power later allowed McDonald's to turn the design into a simple two-arch symbol, connecting roadside architecture with printed and broadcast branding.
Jim Schindler is often confused with Meston because Schindler designed the later logo version in 1962. Meston's contribution was the restaurant architecture; Schindler's was the graphic mark derived from it.