Museum Exhibition Design, Schematic Design – Part I

 

My firm Mark Walhimer Exhibition Design has been hired by the Los Vaqueros Intrpretive Center to create a schematic design for their new exhibits as part of their California Proposition 84 grant proposal.  As I am going through the process I thought it might be interesting to document the steps of the schematic design process.

1. Prior to the first meeting with the client gather general information (review website, admission cost, membership cost, location, demographics of location, museum square footage)
2. First meeting review current museum exhibitions and programs, review current museum objectives and mission, review with floor staff what is working well and not working well, understand desired outcomes of new exhibition
3. While with client create initial sketches and get feedback
4. While with client discuss possible exhibition ideas
5. Photograph current exhibition spaces and space for new exhibition
6. Document findings of first meeting
7. Review meeting notes with client
8. Create photo pages of the current exhibitions and space for new exhibition.  Review objectives as part of photo pages
9. Create style boards, a visual collage representation of the new exhibition
10. Create a Venn diagram of the visitor path and content
11. Review with client, photo pages, style boards and Venn diagram
12. Make revisions to photo pages, style boards and Venn diagram
13. Create framework for final design presentation
14. Create draft exhibition walk-through.  Describe the exhibition visitor experience
15. Create budget framework
16. Create schedule framework
17. Review budget and schedule with client, often it is helpful to review budget and schedule prior to designing exhibition.
18. Draft Schematic design drawings
19. Client feedback
20. Revise budget and schedule with client feedback on drawings
21. Revise drawings
22. Assemble draft schematic design presentation containing; general museum information, exhibition objectives, exhibition walk-through, budget, schedule, schematic drawings, exhibition narrative, Venn Diagram and Style board
23. Review draft design presentation with client
24. Make revisions to design presentation
25. Print out final design presentation either 11″ x 17″ or 8.5″ x 11″
26. One copy for client, one digital copy on CD

The above effort represents between 40 hours ($5000) and 320 hours ($40,000) depending on the exhibition square footage.  In a future post I will share a complete schematic design presentation.

Photo – Current entrance to Interpretive Center