The News 03.16.2021

News from the worlds of exhibition design, interior design, and environmental graphics.

The secret life of museums during lockdown; “we miss our visitors” | COVID study finds that museums are safer than any other indoor activity | Covid-19 has driven millions of women out of the workforce | Smithsonian scales back its $2 billion expansion plan | Congress authorizes two new Smithsonian museums: the National Museum of the American Latino and the American Women’s History Museum — hoorah! | Steal this job: museum exhibit designer | Or build your own museum in a box | Researching a sustainable kitchen countertop | Should we revisit the term “master bedroom”? — and committing to “going into the basement” | I Love Typography’s favorite fonts of 2020 | Lessons learned about team projects | A treasure trove of exhibition design inspiration: past winners of the SEGD global design awards | Benchmarks for online museums | And while poking around the onlines, I found that an exhibit I designed is on Google Street View Arts & Culture! Here are some screenshots from Pacific Exchange: China & U.S. Mail, which was on view in 2014/2015 at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum:

It’s a little “uncanny valley,” but also really neat to see an old friend. (Previous blog coverage, here and here.)

Two more at the Hirshhorn Museum

Phew! It has been a busy 14+ months since I last posted. (14 months?! Oh my....) In that time, I’ve designed seven exhibitions of varying size and scope, four print projects, and three large production jobs. I am currently in early design development for an exciting project in Maine, and then there is the typical day-to-day of running a small design studio. Yep, just sitting around eating bon-bons.

In an attempt to get back into posting on The Exhibit Designer, I am kicking off with a book-end to my last post: two more exhibitions at the Hirshhorn Museum. These two were both located in the same gallery, and were on view one right after the other.

Baselitz: Six Decades ran from June 21, 2018 through September 16, 2018, then Rafael Lozano-Hemmer: Pulse opened in its place on November 1. Pulse is on view for another month, if you’d like to check it out.

The title treatment for Pulse played on the visual of the pulsing incandescent light bulbs hanging from the ceiling in Lozano-Hemmer’s installation Pulse Room …

… while the title for Baselitz was a straight-forward title lockup. An early concept, in which “George” and “Baselitz” were alternately flipped upside down (Baselitz is known for his “inverted” paintings) was rejected, and I am a little sad for what could have been.

In the end, the final title lockup and entry wall treatment created a neat refraction effect when ascending the escalator, as the letters reflected in the glass.

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Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 25 March 2019.

The Utopian Projects and What Absence Is Made Of

The Markus Lüpertz exhibition I shared in my last post is no longer on view at the Hirshhorn — it came and went so quickly! — but the museum has two other exhibitions currently on view for which I designed the graphics. First, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov: The Utopian Projects:

Working in collaboration with the museum’s design department, I designed the exhibition’s title wall, didactic graphics, and wall quotations.

The title wall graphic is printed on DreamScape’s self-adhesive wallcovering, Caviar texture. I like the print quality of DreamScape wallcoverings — I first spec’ed them for the exhibits at the FDR Museum, and have used them a few times since. The wallcovering was installed using butt seams. The installers (Blair, Inc. in Virginia, also the graphics fabricator) wrapped the wallcovering around the wall’s edges, a tricky detail that would have looked terrible if done poorly.

The graphic panels are digital prints wrapped on sign blank with a matte over-laminate. They are hung on French cleats (simple but strong), which is an easy way to hang nearly anything. Also on the panels’ backsides is MDF blocking that provides rigidity for the sign blank fronts. Here’s a photo I snapped during installation, of the backsides:

The Utopian Projects is on view through March 4. The Kabakovs’ work is fascinating — their models are so cool. Check it out if you can!

The other exhibition at the Hirshhorn, for which I designed the graphics, is What Absence Is Made Of, on view through Summer 2019. For this exhibition I designed the title wall, didactics, and an exterior advertising poster for the National Mall.

The curator requested reflective vinyl. In addition to layout experiments, I played with color combinations (silver on white? silver on black? on gray? which gray?). I love the way the selected title design looks in silver vinyl — it catches reflections and disappears, then reappears, as you walk by it.

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 5 January 2018.

Letters With Wings sneak peek at the National Postal Museum

If you stop by the Smithsonian National Postal Museum during the next couple of months, you’ll be able to see two exhibitions that I’ve designed. One is New York City: A Portrait Through Stamp Art (on view through May 14; full project view here); the other just opened.

Beneath the museum’s escalators, in the Franklin Foyer, are two cases for temporary exhibitions. The museum intends to change these cases often with displays of recent acquisitions, favorite objects, niche subjects, and the like.

I created a design system for the museum’s in-house use when putting together these quick little exhibitions, and I designed the first exhibition to use the system: a “sneak peek” of an upcoming exhibition about WWII airmail tentatively called Letters With Wings.

The design system included color palette, guidelines for layout of didactic and label graphics, sets of case furniture and graphic panels, and examples of case arrangements.

I also designed a series of banners and an “attract graphic” to brand the Franklin Foyer space. The attract graphic will be a geometric, cone-like acrylic structure with a changeable title panel; two will be installed in the open triangles of space between the artifact cases and the undersides of the escalators. (You can see the “open triangles of space” in the photos above.) They will protrude slightly into the space, above head level, and draw visitors’ attention from the atrium space. They’re not currently installed, but I look forward to seeing them there in the future.

There are no physical artifacts in either case of the currently installed exhibition, so objects are represented as printed graphics. (Docents will occasionally bring out the real objects for visitors, which are being prepared for the larger exhibition.) The printed representations are mounted to sintra (a lightweight, yet rigid, PVC sheet) to give them depth.

If you’re in the Washington, DC area, please check out this little exhibition — and New York Stamp Art, too — while they’re still on view!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 28 March 2017.

Pointe-à-Callière: Crossroads, Building Montréal, Snow

My final post about the Montréal museums I saw during my visit to the city in September 2015 — see also the Insectarium, the Biodôme, and Lazy Love at the Biodôme — here’s a look back at Pointe-à-Callière, Montreal’s Archeology and History Complex.

The Pointe-à-Callière complex is built on archeological sites that span the city’s history. Exploring the museum is very interesting, and a lot of fun — you take passageways, bridges, and stairs over and through the archeological remains. Like the museum building itself, which was built on pilings to protect the site, exhibition elements tread lightly among the artifacts, and visitors are asked repeatedly via signage not to touch the remains. Like most places in Montréal, museum graphics are in French with English translations. I like the way the two languages are interwoven on the red lobby banner above.

The permanent exhibition in the basement, Crossroads Montréal, takes you through 1,000 years of the city’s remains, including the first Catholic cemetery (dating from 1643), and the foundation of the Royal Insurance Building (dating from 1861). Excavations continue and more exhibitions are planned to interpret what is unearthed. On the one hand: very cool premise, and very cool space to explore. On the other, I had trouble getting and keeping my bearings. Perhaps because the graphics didn’t hold my attention? The ruins themselves were more intriguing.

I would have liked more information directed at the museum “streakers” like myself: the people who move quickly through exhibitions, and only read titles and very selective [random] bits and pieces of labels. (On my best days, I can be a “stroller.”) Perhaps a printed guide map would have helped me to understand where I was within the museum and what I was looking at. Perhaps I should have taken a guided tour.

I did like the graphics’ integration into the museum’s building structure, particularly the ceilings, and the minimalist construction-site aesthetic of their structures. Artifact cases, too, were carefully integrated into the site.

Most graphics were rear-illuminated, which worked perfectly with the museum’s underground atmosphere.

Also below-ground is the Building Montréal exhibition, where you’ll find the museum’s archeological crypt. The photos below are of the vaulted stone tunnel built on the bed of the Saint-Pierre River. See what I mean about the museum being fun to explore?

Set into the floor of Building Montréal are more than a dozen dioramas that show the city at different points in time. I love this use of space, and the vantage point it gives visitors. (I wrote this post about exhibition flooring, seven years ago, and Bridget mentioned the Pointe-à-Callière in the comments. I finally saw it for myself!)

At the time, the museum also had a temporary exhibit on view called Snow, a fun look at winter culture in Canada. Notice the snowflakes cut from the apron fronts of reader rails!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 25 March 2017.

AIGA Design Week and Timber City at National Building Museum

DC Design Week events have wrapped. This was a good Design Week — there were many more events than in years past, with a range of design focuses — and I was able to make it to a number of them! An event of particular interest to exhibition designers was held on Wednesday, at the National Building Museum: Design Matters with Debbie Millman featuring Abbott Miller: Design for the Built Environment.

The conversation touched on exhibition design, architectural graphics, and performance design. And as a bonus, prior to the event start, the museum's newest temporary exhibition, Timber City, was open for us.

Timber City opened in September and is on view at NBM through May 2017. The two huge title signs in the museum atrium draw your eye up and point to the bay where the exhibition is located. Also impressive in its scale is the scaffolding holding up the signage.

The exhibition is not restricted to the interior gallery space. Lining the hall outside the gallery are large plinths, of staggered heights, that feature stories about buildings' timber technology. Within the window bays are views into the exhibition, and architectural models in cases. The text on the painted green walls appears to be cut vinyl.

Inside the gallery space, the exhibition is made up of large-scale, extra-thick, freestanding wood walls. (You can see the support structures below.) Graphics appear to be a mix of direct-print and cut vinyl. The large murals at either end of the gallery space are applied wallpapers.

Note for future exhibits: Laminated Strand Lumber does not take cut vinyl letters well. (above)

In the center of the gallery space are a trio of cheeky display case plinths, made of stacked wood circles. The wood walls are peppered with infographics, stylized illustrations, and green circles highlighting quick facts about timber.

Timber City was curated and designed by Boston-based ikd. And thanks to AIGA DC for putting on a great week of design events!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been replaced with archived URLs, courtesy of archive.org. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 31 October 2016.

SEGD tour of National Museum of Health and Medicine

On Sunday I attended a tour of the very cool National Museum of Health and Medicine, now located in Silver Spring, Maryland. NMNH is a Department of Defense museum first established in 1862 as the Army Medical Museum, “a center for the collection of specimens for research in military medicine and surgery.”

The tour was organized by the Washington, DC chapter of SEGD (formerly the Society for Environmental Graphic Design, now the Society for Experiential Graphic Design) and led by members of the museum’s staff and the design team from Gallagher & Associates. (I used to be a designer at G&A.)

There was a crowd in attendance so we were split into two groups. My group was led by graphic designer Liza Rao (responsible for the museum’s fantastic colors and typography), and Andrea Schierkolk, NMHM’s public programs manager. It was a treat to hear reflections from both sides; what they love and what they love less; things that work great and things that didn't turn out as expected. It was also a treat to see some of my former colleagues.

The museum is divided into three major exhibits: Collection That Teaches (purple), Anatomy and Pathology (turquoise), and Advances in Military Medicine (brick red). Crisp white casework and glass shelves give the exhibit a “lab-like” look that I enjoyed, and the bold shots of color look great against the mostly tan, cream, and yellow objects on display — yes, most of those objects are corporeal remains. This museum is not for the sensitive of stomach.

The exhibits were designed precisely for the current objects on display, yet they are still changeable — graphics can be slid in and out as objects are rotated or stories are updated.

Thank you to our new DC SEGD chairs, Liza and Chris, for the great program — keep them coming, please!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 16 March 2016.

Lazy Love at the Biodôme

I was in Montréal for just shy a week and spent a few hours at the Biodôme — it was so much fun! I have plenty to share of the rest of the museum, but to dip my toes back into blogging after (ahem) plenty of time away, here are some photos of the temporary exhibit/art installation, Calme Aimant (Lazy Love).

Within the low, glass-walled enclosure, sloths slept inside their cocoon-like nests, hanging from artistic interpretations of trees — the trees were wrapped in braids and painted in monochrome — while a couple tortoises tottered around. Sheer white fabric panels hung from the ceiling, rippling slightly as people passed beneath them.

The exhibit invited guests to have a seat and enjoy a few moments of quiet contemplation. A quiet soundscape played from speakers hidden within the sofas — the speakers are the balls with red felt flowers — and fabric books told the sloths’ story.

Lazy Love was our last stop at the Biodôme, and it was a lovely, relaxing, quiet moment to end on. I am sorry to report that the exhibit closed last week, so a bientôt, sloths.

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been replaced with archived URLs, courtesy of archive.org. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 18 September 2015.

Madsonian Museum of Industrial Design

Back in November I took a trip to Warren, Vermont for a shoot with photographer Michael Tallman at the Archie Bunker House. When you hear “Vermont” and “architecture” your thoughts might not wander much beyond old red barns, but look up Prickly Mountain — the “anti-establishment utopia” of contemporary architecture. The Archie Bunker House is in that neighborhood of modernist homes, and really incredible. The shoot was a blast, and I promised David Sellers, the owner and architect of the house, that I would visit the Madsonian, his industrial design museum up the road.

I ran out of time during that trip in November, but a few weeks ago I made good on the promise, returned to Vermont and paid a visit to the Madsonian Museum of Industrial Design in Waitsfield. The temperature outside was somewhere between 0 and 5 degrees, and inside, the museum wasn’t much warmer, but still my friends and I had a great time touring the museum with Mr. Sellers himself as our tour guide.

The museum has an Industrial Designers “wall of fame,” an assortment of chair designs, vintage advertisements torn straight from magazines and pinned to the walls …

… lighting, a Mason and Hamlin organ, and a 1934 DeSoto Airflow coupe …

… an automatic pencil sharpener, Polaroid cameras, and many, many more examples of vintage and antique industrial design. Most everything on display had a personal story attached, such as this menu from the ocean liner SS Normandie. A couple donated it to the museum after their visit — they had honeymooned on the ship in the 1930s and kept the menu as a souvenir.

The layout of the exhibit was strictly utilitarian, with minimal to no explanatory text or graphics and the bones of the building which housed it on display. One bit of clever exhibitry I liked was the use of retractable extension cord reels for spot lighting. Need to move something around? Just screw in a new hook.

The Madsonian currently has an exhibit of classic toy designs, featuring model airplanes and trains (including the two biggest model trains built), an original Mr. Machine, and a toy cement mixer which a kid could use to mix actual cement. The toy’s fatal flaw was user error — most surviving examples are welded inoperable by dried cement.

If you go, be sure to grab a sandwich and a Sip of Sunshine afterward, at the Bridge Street Butchery (now closed) across the street.

Thank you to Michael Tallman for all photographs and to Dave Sellers for the museum tour!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 1 March 2015.

Pacific Exchange, open at the National Postal Museum

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

It’s open! Okay, old news. It opened well over a month ago, on March 6. I had also planned to post about the opening reception, but that was March 20, so — old news there as well. In any case, the reception was lovely, with Chinese food served and tinkling glassware and everyone dressed quite nicely.

Pacific Exchange: China & U.S. Mail is the second exhibit to be on view in the Postmasters Suite gallery at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum. From the exhibit website: Using mail and stamps, Pacific Exchange brings a human scale to Chinese–U.S. relations in three areas: commerce, culture, and community. The exhibit focuses on the 1860s to the 1970s, a time of extraordinary change in China. It also explores Chinese immigration to the United States, now home to four million Chinese Americans. (Thank you to James O'Donnell of the Smithsonian for the above photo.)

Upfront: I am a bit of a stamp nerd. I have a small collection of Olympics stamps, mostly international, from the 1960s and 1970s. (You have to focus when collecting stamps!) So I really enjoyed working on an exhibit about philately.

This was my swan song at Gallagher & Associates. I handled the design myself, from designing the exhibit’s visual concept to laying out production files for all of the graphics. I also designed the exhibit plan and artifact case layouts. Even though this is a small exhibit space, it had more than 100 artifacts, so making [nearly] everything fit comfortably was a bit of a challenge!

The design drawing above is an example of how a case layout looked during design development, and below are those same cases, made real:

Graphics were digital output mounted on sign blank, trimmed to edges, with a matte overlaminate. The wall-mounted and freestanding graphics were backed with 1/2" MDF painted Benjamin Moore “Bonfire” to match the primary exhibit red (Pantone 1795). The freestanding graphics had duplicate panels on either side of the mdf — a panel sandwich which was held in place by adjustable metal sign bases. The Smithsonian Office of Exhibits Central printed and built the graphic components. Blair Fabrication built the case furniture.

Most of the exhibit text is in English and Chinese, a design challenge I enjoyed. In the artifact case below, some of the artifacts were loans that had to be displayed flat. The other half of the plinth has a 15° rise to create a comfortable reading angle.

I arrived at the color palette after some research into significant colors in Chinese culture. I used red and gold as the dominant exhibit colors, with a deeper maroon red for accent. I used a third red, one with pink undertones — red, is the color of prosperity and good fortune, among other meanings — for the Commerce section of the exhibit; yellow, the color of heroism, for the Community section; and blue-green (or qing), to give a feeling of Chinese history and tradition, for the Culture section. I also drew distinctive vector patterns for each section.

The element that most people extol is the group of banners in the entrance. There are three individual banners and they’re more than 20 feet tall! EPI Colorspace printed and installed them. (Install photos here.) They were printed on “Brilliant Banner” 12 mil. polyester banner fabric. The fabric has a very subtle canvas texture that wasn’t what I originally intended — I wanted a silken look for the banners — but the color saturation and printing quality was so good that I went with EPI’s recommendation.

I also designed a few of the related print graphics: the exhibit catalogue, a postcard, and the invitation to the opening reception.

The exhibit has been well-received overall and I’m thrilled with how everything turned out. If you’re in DC between now and January 4, 2015, please check it out!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits and additional photos. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 26 April 2014.

My hazy memories of the Perot Museum

A few days ago I was talking with some colleagues about the Perot Museum of Nature and History in Dallas, Texas. Someone remembered one responsive interactive; I remembered a different one ... and then I remembered that I haven’t shared any photos from my visit (nearly a year ago).

The responsive interactive I remembered was located in the lobby. Models of water molecules danced up and down from the ceiling in response to the movements of people below. The molecule models were controlled by cameras in the ceiling that sensed movement and triggered motors that made them dance.

And that’s about where my specific memories break down. What I do remember is how large the museum is, with 11 permanent exhibit halls, and that the day I went it was JAM-PACKED.

There was something there for everyone though, even if it took a bit of maneuvering to get around and find it. I liked the dinosaur gallery:

And bits and pieces of other galleries, including the entrance to the Gems and Minerals Hall:

I was really taken with these benches sprinkled throughout the museum, with their cut-out factoids:

Overall, we were intrigued, learned some things, and had fun. (Just don’t ask me for details.)

I’ll wrap this post up with a photo I took of the roof. From the museum’s Wikipedia page: “It has a stone roof which features a landscape of drought-tolerant greenery inspired by Dallas surroundings. … Building on the museum’s commitment to resource conservation, the new building integrates a variety of sustainable strategies including a rainwater collection system that captures run-off water from the roof and parking lot, satisfying 74% of the museum’s non-potable water needs and 100% of its irrigation needs.”

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 20 March 2014.

Pacific Exchange install

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

I stopped by the Smithsonian National Postal Museum to check in on the installation of Pacific Exchange. I’m excited for the exhibit — my last project Gallagher & Associates — to open next week, on March 6.

While I was onsite, EPI Colorspace was there installing the large-format graphics. I’m very satisfied with the quality. Above, one of the EPI crew installs the hanging hardware for the set of three banners that introduce the exhibit. To the right is a fourth banner with the exhibit title.

After the banners were unfurled they were checked and checked again to ensure that they hung plumb. (Success!) The major graphics for this exhibit were in both English and simplified Chinese. Below: The windows to the right of the banners belong to the educational loft; we had some spectators!

Below: A detail of the weight and stitching at the banner’s bottom.

Above: Within the exhibit’s main room there is another dramatic introductory moment, this time produced in fabric stretched over a wooden frame and hung with heavy-duty D rings. There were happily no problems with measurements and everything went up easy peasy — I had my fingers crossed because there are odd cabinets with door knobs and molding behind the graphic. The EPI crew said I must be lucky.

Below: Graphics wait to be installed within the window openings between the gallery and the lobby.

Above: Work zone!—and three of the completed artifact cases. Below: Installed artifacts. More photos to come when everything is complete!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 27 February 2014.

FDR Museum, part 4: rear-lit and neon

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

To wrap up my series on the design, fabrication, and installation of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Museum, a close look at the first exhibition gallery.

The first gallery sets the stage for FDR’s presidency: the Great Depression. The focal point here is the neon-illuminated “FEAR” wall. Text is silkscreened onto the glass panels and rear-illuminated with LED pads. The red color comes from the custom “UMEMPLOYED” neon letters; the mural image in the back is a black and white photographic print.

The FEAR letters are applied to the rear of the glass. I wanted them to be translucent — to allow the mural image to show through and create depth — and also be as richly black as possible. The fabricators, Explus, provided a variety of production samples to try to achieve the effect I was after. Printing the letters on a transparent film and applying it to the glass, in particular, was unacceptable as I wanted a uniform transparency (no streaks, no dots).

Explus created a self-adhering vinyl by applying Sentinel OptiClear Adhesive to the face of the gel sheet (Rosco Cinegel Neutral Density N.9 Gel Extra Wide) and die-cutting it. I was happy, but the fabricators had some difficulty with cutting and applying the gel sheets. Their graphics manager told me that if they were to do something like this again they would use a standard window tint that has the application adhesive already on it. Here’s the sample:

Turning to the wall opposite:

The background mural is printed on DreamScape, as I mentioned in a previous post. Most of the murals in this museum were applied to backers, framed, and cleat-hung to the wall, but this particular one was applied directly to the wall and its edges captured with flat aluminum strips.

The framed graphics are digital prints with an overlaminate, mounted to sign blank. They were applied onsite to an MDF backer panel and aluminum frame. (The backer and frame are screwed to the exhibit wall; the graphic is applied with VHB tape.) Explus welded the frames’ corners before painting them, and that made a huge difference in the appearance of them. They are nicely finished and high-quality.

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 25 June 2013.

FDR Museum, part 3: almost done!

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

I am back in Hyde Park — installation continues! The exhibits are quickly coming together as the opening nears. Most of the graphics are hung, dimensional letters have been pinned (there are a ton throughout the museum — I went dimensional-letter-happy), and the interactives are being field-tested. I think it all is looking great. Some photos of the A New Deal gallery:

Artifact cases are being filled:

It’s a papier-mâché FDR sphinx!

The World War II timeline is nearly complete (two weeks ago there wasn’t much hung besides the skeleton). What a bear that was to design!

I may have snuck into some New York Times photos while I was onsite. The critic and photographer were there, I was there ... who’s to say. We’ll see.

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits and additional photos. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 24 June 2013.

FDR Museum, part 2: installation continues

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

I was back onsite with the Gallagher team at the FDR Library this past week and took more photos of the exhibit installation. It’s exciting to see the various elements go up. The exhibits are dense and layered; it’s a big story to tell in a relatively small space. The exhibits are in the original — now renovated — library conceived by Roosevelt himself so we were restricted to the existing spaces while designing the new exhibits.

Most of the graphics still have a protective film layer and ID label on them. In other places there are backers awaiting graphics, brown paper-wrapped graphics sitting on the floor, and assorted construction detritus. But bit-by-bit it’s going up! And we all know that everything happens in the last week before opening anyway. ;)

Updated, to add a photo of the finished gallery, The Promise of Change:

Updated, to add a photo of the finished gallery, Foundations of a Public Life:

Below, left: These graphics will be installed into the WWII timeline, on the right side of the photo above. They are printed on Laserchrome, which I mentioned in my previous post — and they look incredible.

I also mentioned the DreamScape wallcovering; below is a shot of some installed murals. I think they look good. Once the text panels, dimensional titles, reader rails, etc. go up — it will look great. More, soon!

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits and additional photos. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 16 June 2013.

FDR Museum, part 1: under construction and opening soon

Work shown was completed while I was a designer at Gallagher & Associates.

For the past couple of years I’ve been working on the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum, in Hyde Park, New York and (holy cow) the public opening is less than a month away. With time dwindling, I am finally sharing some process photos: production samples, shop visits, and installation.

The library has been posting photos of the installation on their tumblr. (2021 update: their tumblr is still going strong!) The photo below comes from there; I grabbed it to highlight the graphic in the background. There are four of these structures throughout the museum, one for each of FDR’s elections.

The “election stats” graphics are silkscreened onto Acrylite P-95 with white vinyl film adhered to the second surface. Silkscreening on P-95 creates a subtle shadow, which at certain angles makes the text appear dimensional. (For this reason, it should also be done with caution.) Here’s a photo of the sample provided by Explus, the fabricator (the installed graphic above is waiting for its red dimensional stars to be attached):

Below, the main story panels, used in the World War II gallery, which I am especially happy with:

They’re built from 5/8" clear acrylic, which has been painted on the front surface with acrylic paint, with a “window” left free of paint. The text is printed onto the painted acrylic surface, and then the photo — a Laserchrome metallic print — is adhered to the second surface of the acrylic, within the window area.

The photo above gives you a sense of the depth and jewel box effect created by layering the photo behind the acrylic. And here’s a peek at the backside of the pane. The aluminum angle frames are painted with Matthews acrylic polyurethane paint:

For wall murals I spec’ed DreamScape wallcoverings in various finishes. Above is another photo from the FDR blog, showing a few installed murals (currently missing their dimensional titles, and the scaffolding structure that will be located in front). I’m pleased with the crisp image quality, especially on the rough textures, such as “Plaster” (below, on the left) and “Mystical” (on the right).

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 3 June 2013.

The News 08.16.12

A compilation of design-related web finds.

The Google Web Lab at the Science Museum in London | Designing for Accessibility: MoMA’s Material Lab | Harvard Medical School’s “Training the Eye” course | SEGD is hosting a symposium, “The Art of Collaboration” (link no longer available) in Raleigh October 4–5 | The last day to see the Terracotta Warriors in North America is August 26 in Times Square | The National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia now offers free admission for their first floor gallery | Why the Museum of Broken Relationships is so great (it’s not just the name) | 100 Toys that Define Our Childhood — vote for your favorites for a new exhibit at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. Voting ends tomorrow, August 17 | Places that Work: U.S. Botanic Gardens | Spiders Alive! at the American Museum of Natural History (NY Times review) | Are some fonts more believable than others? and How to explain why typography matters | I’ve been pinning obsessively over on Pinterest.

Post updated in January 2021 with minor text edits. Broken links have been replaced with archived URLs, courtesy of archive.org. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 16 August 2012.

Game on: The Art of Video Games

I visited The Art of Video Games at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. (It’s gotten quite a bit of press — here is one thoughtful review, from The Mary Sue.) The exhibit covers the past 40 years of video game art and includes interviews of game designers and developers, conceptual art, video displays of 80 games (voted on by the public), and playable games (five, for the five eras of game technology).

I would have loved to play some Super Mario Brothers, but the wait was at least 10 kids deep so I had to move on. Vintage game consoles were on display in lit display “consoles,” along with video game stills and interpretive text.

The exhibit designers describe their process and the materials and production techniques used, in this blog post from Smithsonian Exhibits. There is also an upcoming gallery talk, “Building The Art of Video Games“ (link no longer available) on August 21. For those of you not in the DC area, the exhibit will travel beginning late October.

Post updated in January 2021 with text edits. Broken links have been replaced with archived URLs, courtesy of archive.org. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 15 August 2012.

BoNE Show 2011, the wrap-up

The AIGA BoNE Show — Best of New England [Design] — is a design competition for New England, hosted biennially by AIGA Boston. I was asked to direct the 2011 show, after doing a decent job of designing the exhibit for the 2009 show, and when I said “yes!” without even thinking about it, I found myself responsible for its call-for-entries, judging, meet-the-judges event, awards show, exhibition, website, catalogue ... every little thing involved in putting on a design competition. (It was also the very last thing I did before I left Boston for DC, back in June.)

First I had to create a theme. I worked with George Restrepo to brainstorm a half dozen promising directions. The eventual winner — “Wicked Problems/Wicked Solutions” — was born while myself, George, and a couple other AIGA volunteers on the BoNE committee were discussing the concept of wicked problems and how design is essential to problem solving. Keeping tongue in cheek, I also liked that if people didn’t exactly understand the deeper meaning of the theme, it could also be interpreted as simply “wicked” in the New England sense.

The call-for-entries (above), designed by Kristen Coogan, featured a playful Rube Goldberg-esque problem-solving machine. This visual identity was carried through the rest of the competition and awards show’s graphic pieces, including the website, designed by Justin Hattingh, with technical assistance from Jeremy Perkins.

Below: In keeping everything aligned to the theme, at the meet-the-judges event — held in Boston the evening before judging began — the three judges each gave a presentation related to “wicked problems.”

All event and exhibition photos by Ben Gebo Photography. More event photos, here.

When designing the exhibition, we continued to play with the problem solving theme. Katelyn Mayfield designed a component-based display system: individual displays could be arranged in any configuration to take advantage of our huge gallery space on Boston University’s campus. The displays could then be packed flat and shipped to other venues when the BoNE Show “went on the road” after its run in Boston.

Here is the exhibition, full of guests on the evening of the awards show:

Exhibit displays were located in the front third of the 808 Gallery. Each display was custom-designed for the design project it held and hand-built from corrugated plastic sheets and PVC pipes. Windows and shelves were built by cutting and folding the plastic sheets, by Katelyn and a crack team of volunteers, including BU’s student AIGA group.

WICKED PROBLEMS and WICKED SOLUTIONS were applied to the wall in giant red and cyan vinyl. Winners’ names were laser cut from thick illustration board and the edges of shelves were finished with cyan-colored tape.

Above, left: I commissioned furniture designer Seth Wiseman of ConForm Lab to design and build two sets of benches which could be moved into endless configurations — a human-sized three-dimensional tangram game. The benches were sold during the event auction and the money benefited AIGA Boston. Seth also designed and built the tangram stage, which is in a couple of photos below.

Above, right: For the media-based winning entries, we built a simple kiosk. Joe Morris designed the interface.

Below, left: Dan Watkins (aka Dan the Man Photo) manned the “photo booth.” He also shot all the photography for the show’s catalogue. Below, right: DJs Dan Riti & Kevin James in their sophomore BoNE Show appearance.

Above, left: The silent auction table. We also held a live auction for the big-ticket items. Jason Stevens and Kathleen Byrnes headed the sponsorship drive. Because the point of this entire production was to raise money for AIGA, we tried to get everything for free (or at least on the cheap), and were very thankful for all of our generous sponsors.

And then there was the gorgeous (award-winning, itself) awards show catalogue, designed by George Restrepo and printed and bound by ACME Bookbinding. The embossed covers came in both red and cyan. The keepsake entry ticket was designed by Ira Cummings and printed and foil stamped by EM Letterpress.

And … the awards show! AIGA Boston chapter president Matthew Bacon served as Master of Ceremonies. Trophies were bone-shaped and cast in aluminum (bronzed for the Judges’ Choice winners), with embossed winners’ names. Names were all punched by hand (by Bridget Sandison, who also — along with Juliana Press and Meghann Hickson — took care of receiving and sorting and tracking all the competition entries) using a vintage Dymo label maker. Same way the awards have been made since the BoNE Show’s inception in 1995.

Thank you to Tracy Swyst, AIGA Boston’s VP of operation, who has overseen many many many BoNE Shows, and to the rest of the AIGA Boston board: Heather, Jodi, Colleen, Brandon, Jillfrancis, Diane, Chiranit, Lee, Mat, Jason R, and Sarah, and to the boards from AIGA Connecticut, Rhode Island, Maine, and NH/VT, and everyone else who lent a hand in any way. It was a really great experience.

Post updated in January 2021 with text edits and minor photo edits. Broken links have been fixed. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 24 April 2012.

Changing Earth, at the Franklin Institute

Changing Earth at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia is about land, air, and water, and how these have changed and continue to change on our planet. There’s a lot happening in this exhibit and it was sometimes overstimulating, but overall it was nicely designed with clear ”take-home” messages and memorable interactive experiences.

The designers, Adirondack Studios, used environmentally-sensitive materials throughout the exhibit. From the museum’s website: “Changing Earth is constructed of sustainable materials. The flooring is made from recycled content and post-consumer waste products. All wood is Forest Stewardship Council certified or bamboo. All metal is recyclable. Paint is low-VOC and graphics are printed on recycled material using water-based inks.”

I visited this exhibit about a year ago, not too long after it opened (and wrote this post about the exhibit, Electricity, which had opened at the same time). My memories of the details are a little fuzzy I’m afraid, but both exhibits are still on view if you’d like to see them in person.

The centerpiece of the exhibit was a giant Earth dome (photo above) which housed an introductory film.

The exhibit was full of interactives and touchable displays, such as a stream table, weather forecast station, and earthquake simulator.

Below is an example of the direct-to-substrate printing used throughout the exhibit.

Post updated in January 2021 with text and photo edits. This post was originally published at theexhibitdesigner.com on 4 April 2012.