Under

About The Entry

Every day, hundreds of performers transform New York City’s subway platforms into spontaneous stages. More than 350 individual musicians and ensembles deliver over 12,000 performances annually across roughly 40 transit locations, turning the daily commute into a living soundscape.

While often overlooked, the subway’s architecture naturally amplifies these performances. The concrete walls and tiled surfaces reflect sound waves in ways similar to professional concert halls, creating a space where music can travel, resonate, and connect. To me, this hidden quality revealed an “underground theater” embedded within the city’s infrastructure—an idea that inspired Under Treats.

The project began with my personal curiosity: why do some of the most emotional performances I’ve heard happen not on stage, but underground? I wanted to capture that raw, communal energy through design—celebrating the subway not just as a transit system, but as a cultural venue shaped by sound, rhythm, and human presence.

At the heart of the design is a custom variable typeface inspired by the visualization of sound waves. Referencing an illustration from Architectural Acoustics depicting sound propagation in a concert hall, I imagined how sound might move through the New York subway. This led to a font that visually echoes the fluid, dynamic nature of performance—expanding and contracting like live sound itself.

The visual system extends this concept through the use of the subway’s original color palette—drawn from its iconic line colors—and photography of performers.

Under reframes the subway as a shared cultural experience, celebrating the creativity that thrives beneath the city’s surface. Through type, color, and motion, the design honors the performers who make New York’s underground pulse with life.

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