When is it socially acceptable for men to wear long artificial nails in the workplace?  When the men are auto designers trying to make car controls workable for women with long nails. When designing the instrument panel of the 1994 Ford Probe, design team leader Mimi Vandermolen required engineers, both male and female, to operate all controls while wearing long press-on nails.

According to a Ford spokesperson, several of the controls were redesigned to accommodate long nails as a result of the tests. Buttons that were initially designed to be depressed in to the dash, for instance, were redesigned so they only needed to be pushed flush with the car surface. It’s nice to see technology responds to the needs of women (nail-wearers in particular). Maybe someday they’ll design a car that can drive itself while we’re waiting for our polish to dry.

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