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"[Mayo is] making a dummy RFID-reader surface for us to mount on a subway turnstile, as well as a companion piece for the MetroCard vending machine. The challenge here is to avoid imposing our own designerly tastes on these artifacts; if we want them to be convincing at that all-important subliminal level, we have to try and imagine them as an extension of the MTA’s existing graphic vocabulary.
And that, in turn, means capturing a certain kind of municipal badness in the design of type and signage: inapposite font selection, clumsy kerning and so on. It’s an odd and demanding kind of discipline — especially for us, with our marked preference for the Vignelliesque."
Realism channeled through suitably ropey implementation.