Auckland War Museum
The Auckland War Memorial Museum is the holder of an extensive military medal collection of over 3,500 medals dating from the Napoleonic Wars through to the present day. Previously only a fraction of the collection was on public display, with the rest stored in an off limits armoury.
This project was a collaboration with the Museum’s exhibition & curatorial teams to envisage a new type of gallery experience, with the entire medal collection visible en masse, centred around three large scale interconnected digital interactives.
*** Awarded silver in the NZ Best Awards 2017 for User Experience.
An overarching theme of 'behind every medal is a story' was developed & became the governing principle for the project. To achieve this, a space needed to be designed that enabled remembrance & reflection of the New Zealand military experience through enquiry. The digital experience needed to be one of rich visceral storytelling. The interfaces needed be intuitive, engaging and insightful.
A total of three interconnected digital interactive experiences, including a 8m video wall supported by a central 65” touchscreen console. The visual design concepts were tested vigorously with users & assessed in the physical museum environment, and refined based on feedback & the evolving data structures available via the Museum’s collection management system.
The resulting exhibition has been a huge success and there have been multiple examples of visitors discovering familial connections with the medals collection through the interactive tools provided.
