A few favorite museum experiences
Week 8: time to distill what we’ve loved and hated about all of our museum visits over the past few weeks into our own experience design manifestos. Here’s mine…
Transport and/or transform the audience, if only for a moment.
Inspire wonder, curiosity, and delight, even in the face of difficult subjects.
Expect the best from visitors; don’t limit engagement with the public to the level of the lowest common denominator. Provide for multiple points of entry to material.
Exclude gratuitously interactive exhibits. Any interaction should support a clear purpose.
Have a sense of humor– about the materials, about the museum itself.
User test at least at the prototype stage, preferably more.
Invite people who genuinely care about the materials to share their passion for those materials with others.
Be flexible and self-aware, adjusting and reframing museum contents appropriately, and addressing mistakes.
Offer an opportunity to read, but don’t require it or rely on it as the only method of explanation.
Compel a sense of “flow” in visitors (i.e. help them feel engaged and challenged, but not overwhelmed).
Convey a mood relevant to presented materials and inspire appropriate behavior in visitors.
Avoid using signage as a crutch.
Provide surprises and mental treats.
Stick to the main idea for any given exhibit.
Furnish adequate space for reflection.
Use people’s emotions to help them identify with stories and engage with materials, but don’t abuse this power.
Be a gracious host.
Do not employ security methods that intimidate visitors.
Provide opportunities for visitors to pursue further learning about the material presented.
Food, if offered, should be delicious and reasonably healthy. Otherwise, provide recommendations for dining nearby.
Be an integral member of the neighborhood (whether virtual or physical). Be ready to provide directions, suggest itineraries, and pass the time of day, like any good neighbor.
Ignore any of the above tenets, but only with well-considered intention and purpose.
Images:
Jellyfish at the Monterey Bay Aquarium
Tell the Bees at the Museum of Jurassic Technology
Joseph Beuys: Multiples at San Jose Museum of Art
Miss Rockaway Armada at Mass MoCA
The old Getty (now the Getty Villa)
nancy
Awesome! This is a great manifesto…an exhaustive list. When you open your exhibit design office, I’d make some groupings: visitor experience, content design, evaluation etc. Can you imagine how great it would be to go to an exhibit/museum where the institution really committed to these things. But here’s the hard part: you ‘ve set up a really tough measuring stick. It’s easy-ish to say transform or transport the visitor if only for a moment. But how do you do that? Is there a central exhibit that will do that or will there be a variety for different visitors? Each one of your points would be an evaluation standard that you’d have to design to or hire to (like hiring nice security guards).
I’m glad to see how much you’ve learned and thought about.
Nov 04, 2009 @ 3:08 am