Who designed the golden arches for McDonald's first franchised restaurants in 1952?

Stanley Clark Meston designed McDonald's golden arches for the company's first franchised restaurants in 1952.

The arches began as physical architectural features, not merely as a printed emblem. McDonald's brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald asked Meston to create a distinctive restaurant design for their San Bernardino-based hamburger business. The resulting buildings used two large yellow arches on opposite sides of the structure.

When viewed from an angle, the arches formed a dramatic visual frame. The design helped restaurants stand out beside roads and became a recognizable part of the brand's architecture. Ray Kroc later expanded the franchise system, but Meston—not Kroc—was the architect associated with the original arches design.

McDonald's eventually simplified the arches into the familiar overlapping “M” symbol used in signs, packaging, advertising, and digital branding. A common mix-up is crediting Kroc with designing the arches; his major role was scaling the franchise business after joining the company in the 1950s.