Principles for museum design
Museums increasingly rely on digital media to present information. Yet, technical evolution of computers, in itself, is not likely to benefit museum communication and visitor experience. Improving such presentation requires a new set of design principles that integrate technology and innovative digital media. Supplying those principles was the purpose of the EU-funded project DIME4HERITAGE (Digital media for heritage: Refocusing design from the technology to the visitor experience). The three-year undertaking was one of few to take a design-research approach, and considered digital media design in the context of museum displays. Investigations employed a grounded theory methodology, utilising interviews, document analysis and a series of design experiments. Work produced a conceptual framework outlining design factors and providing a common frame of reference. Secondly, the effort yielded a methodology encompassing the design principles. Finally, the team organised knowledge transfer workshops. The DIME4HERITAGE project developed certain formalised knowledge about principles for designing digital museum displays. The resulting guidelines and methodology incorporate best practices, which stakeholders can adapt and refer to.
Keywords
Museum design, museum displays, digital media, DIME4HERITAGE, visitor experience, design principles