Over the years, though, that identity began to fade. MTR stations built in the 1990s and 2000s tended towards a neutral palette of whites and greys, with solid plastic or aluminium panels.

When Mead arrived at the MTR in 2013, one of the first things he did was to dig into the system’s heritage – the things that make it distinct from the hundreds of other metro systems around the world. ‘It boiled down to three things – the bold use of colour, the use of mosaics and the use of calligraphy,’ he says.

A number of new stations were already under construction when Mead arrived, including those of the new South Island and West Island line extensions. Mead added colourful mosaic tiles where he could, such as in the West Island line’s lift shafts. Mosaic also found its way into new artworks like Admiralty station’s Playcode by Hong Kong architects plusClover, which uses grey and blue tiles to create both Morse and QR codes that reference the naval heritage of the area and modern communication.