MoMA QNS
- Wayfinding & Signage Projects
New York’s Museum of Modern Art created a temporary home in Queens while the Manhattan facilities were being expanded. The Queens building, the former Swingline factory, housed exhibition spaces, curatorial areas with related research facilities, as well as major artwork storage areas. Working with MoMA QNS identity standards created by Base Design, Two Twelve developed comprehensive exterior and interior signage systems in conjunction with architects and planners Michael Maltzan Architects and Cooper, Robertson & Partners.
For the interior system, our designs encompassed both public and "back of house" facility identification, directional and regulatory signage, as well as a donor recognition wall. To portray a consistent institutional identity, Two Twelve modified elements of the MoMA QNS brand graphics, adjusting the proportions of the typefaces, pictograms, and other elements to work in larger sizes and on three-dimensional surfaces.
Exterior signs comprised supergraphics painted on rooftop fixtures and the building façade making it easy for visitors to locate MoMA QNS in the industrial cityscape. For the rooftop sign, Two Twelve brought Maltzan's concept for a visual puzzle to fruition, resolving issues of scale, perspective and implementation so that visitors arriving on the elevated subway see the MoMA logo/sign appear to assemble and disassemble on the roof as the train approaches the stop closest to the museum.
Photos: Exterior photos: © 2003 Christian Richters
