Environments Studio: Hybrid Exhibit Environments
Part 1: Preliminary Research and Ideation
After hearing about the project and taking a quick look over the brief, I was most inspired by the idea of using technology to enhance the experience of a particular artist’s work, keeping the audience of an on-campus exhibit in mind. I was almost immediately drawn to the idea of talking about Fred McFeely Rogers: creator of one of the most influential children’s shows, Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.
While not an artist in the traditional sense, Mr. Rogers worked through the medium of video, music, and public television to communicate his messages to children. His work is featured in the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh in the form of his puppets, shoes, and sweaters that were used in the show, and there is photography and some interactive exhibits in the museum as well. Mr. Rogers has had a large impact on the previous generation, being most popular around 50 years ago when most current adults were in the target demographic, but having an exhibit in the Miller Institute of Contemporary Art would allow our current generation to understand his influence better and get a deeper understanding of who he was as a person now that his television program is no longer being broadcasted. The target demographic would be college-age students who didn’t grow up with Mr. Rogers to pass his philosophy on, as well as staff and possibly their children to relive the memories of the program and share those memories with their own kids through the exhibit.
While I really enjoyed being able to see the original artifacts from Mister Roger’s Neighborhood, I felt that these pieces seemed slightly separated and disjointed from who Fred Rogers was as a person and the mission that he had with his work, as well as how he made children feel through his television program. The photo of Fred Rogers with Daniel Tiger was actually one of my favorite pieces because it actually showed you a glimpse of who he was as an individual. In my exhibit, I hope to be able to highlight how the Mister Rogers on television was more than just a character played onscreen but actually a look into a genuine, inspirational individual and the life he strove to live as an example for others.
Whilst doing some outside research on Fred Rogers, I found a large collection of meaningful, supportive quotes from him and would hope to include these in my exhibit. Since his work was mostly done through broadcast television, most of his art is shown through his words and the powerful ability they have on the lives of children. Hearing the way in which Mister Rogers speaks to children gives visitors a better glimpse into his thinking, personality, and motivations in producing his show.
“There’s no ‘should’ or ‘should not’ when it comes to having feelings. They’re part of who we are and their origins are beyond our control. When we can believe that, we may find it easier to make constructive choices about what to do with those feelings.”
“I hope you’re proud of yourself for the times you’ve said ‘yes,’ when all it meant was extra work for you and was seemingly helpful only to somebody else.”
The other major bit of inspiration during my research was into the way that Mister Rogers made it a point to keep a clear distinction between the Neighborhood of Make Believe and his own neighborhood set in real life. Thinking about our first lecture on thresholds and transitions between spaces, I think that playing with that boundary could be an interesting incorporation with the layout of the Miller ICA exhibit space. While I don’t have a concrete application for this idea yet, I think it would be something interesting to keep in mind while I gather a more concrete idea of my exhibit space.
Self Reflection: Meta-cognitive Regulation
With the average schedule being a weekly nine hours of work and four hours a week spent in class, I will have to find five hours each week to work on course material outside of class. My schedule is usually pretty full in the mornings and afternoons but clears up in the evenings, and Saturdays are mainly dedicated towards working (I take Sundays off and therefore work mostly all day Saturday). Due to the changing workload and different requirements for each class every week, I felt it would be most helpful for myself if I showed when I am available each week but had the times that is dedicated towards Environments Studio vary so that I can change my schedule according to my needs. Some weeks will also exceed the nine-hour weekly expectation, so I felt it would be best to leave things open and focus on the quality of work done in that time rather than strictly the hours put in.
Part 2: Story-boarding, Mood-boarding, and Overall Design Concept
In my mood board, I spent most of my efforts on finding images that matched the tone and color scheme of my exhibit concept, using search words like nostalgia, toys, and the 1960s. The font is meant to mimic the one used in the show’s logo, mostly used for the titles in the exhibit. My main goal is to have the place feel welcoming and to bring you back to the time when Mister Rogers was at its peak, steering away from the traditional museum environment (dramatic lighting, feeling like a visitor). The addition of the television was also along this point, striving to make the place feel more like home with a warm and welcome atmosphere.
My storyboard centers around following two main personas: an adult, who grew up with Mister Rogers as a child, and a current child without much prior knowledge about who Mister Rogers was. The main takeaway for the adult is to remember and enjoy Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood while also learning more about his life and legacy, while the main takeaway for the child is to see what kind of person Mister Rogers was through his work and to experience the show like the parent had done. Each figure takes its own path through the exhibit as a result — the child moves towards the television before looking at anything else, while the parent begins with Mister Rogers’ early life, joins the child at the TV once reaching that part of the exhibit, and the two of them then experience Fred Roger’s legacy together before exiting. While there is no way to control how each individual makes their way through the exhibit, I wanted the design to cater towards both those familiar and unfamiliar with his work.
My first floor plan and parti diagram was pretty simple, but I was able to create a circular path for visitors to move through that takes them through his life: a welcome at the beginning, early life before his television career, his television work, and his legacy after television. My main idea for an interaction, the television corner, would come at the end of the television section so that it would be visible right when you walk in and draw in visitors.
My concept for my interaction is a television that senses when people are nearby to turn on and start playing the theme to Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and get them watching. Next to the television would be a box of puppets and toys from the show: Daniel Striped Tiger, X the Owl, and the Neighborhood Trolley among others. When the visitor interacts with the toy, the television can sense their heat signature along with the sensor inside the puppet/toy and will then show a clip that includes that character in the show. For someone without any prior knowledge of Mister Rogers, this would be an engaging and exciting way to see the context in which these characters emerged, and for someone already familiar with Mister Rogers, it would serve as a way for them to search for their favorite clips by character and see some of their favorite episodes.
LittleBits Prototyping
The LittleBits prototyping exercise was an enjoyable way for me to start thinking about how technology interacts with the physical world and how the two can enhance each other’s experience. With hybrid environments becoming more commonplace, gaining that understanding about how physical and the digital space interact is vital. For example, the emerging era of “smart hospitals” allow hospitals to better utilize their workers and improve overall team productivity and therefore funds, using technology as a way to emphasize doctors and nurses being where they are needed most. That overall concept was one of the biggest goals with my interaction; using technology as a way to enhance a physical interaction, not replace it. There is such a difference between playing with a puppet or toy and pressing an icon that looks like a toy on a screen. While my planned interaction is headed in a much different direction than my LittleBits idea, I’m glad that I was able to get some experience with the medium to play and understand it better before diving right in.
Thinking about new technology, I began brainstorming various other methods of incorporating technology into my exhibit design. Music, for example, is a huge part of Mister Roger’s Neighborhood that I thought it would be fun to possible have a piano projected onto the floor of the exhibit that would highlight the notes of some of Fred Rogers’ most famous songs for visitors to collaborate together and play along. I also debated handing out some sort of toy to visitors at the beginning that allow them to interact with the space to make certain objects be revealed or move, allowing them to feel more like an active participant in the exhibit. Lastly, continuing on my previous interaction idea, I wanted to make it more advanced and take the possibility of multiple visitors interacting with the television and find episodes that include more than one character so they can work together to see more clips and don’t end up fighting over whose puppet gets shown.
Physical Model
When creating the physical model, I really felt that I was able to try and bridge the gap between my mood board (conceptual, feeling-based) and my storyboard (concrete, interaction-based). The space required quite a bit of planning, as I was able to pick the video clips that I wanted to show, the images of Mister Rogers to include, and the overall feeling of the space. I wanted this exhibit to feel intimate and personal, so I modeled the interior life a house, adding trim to the walls, framing childhood photos and family photos on a small scale, and putting carpet in for the floors. I also included several quotes from Mister Rogers since I feel that his words are some of the most powerful tools he used and the best insight into his character. There is also a table at the end with cards for visitors to take away with some words of affirmation from Mister Rogers, an image of one of the characters, and then information on the Children’s Museum in case they would like to visit. The main intent with my exhibit was to get visitors excited about who Mister Rogers is through his work, motivating them to see the memorabilia of his that is in the actual Children’s Museum exhibit.
Parti Diagram
The biggest difference in my new Parti Diagram changed the central wall into an “L” shape, and the television section became nestled inside it. I made this change so that the visitors watching television would feel more enclosed and less out in the open in the middle of the exhibit, now that they have their own sort of room to watch. While I debated making the area even more closed off for privacy, I figured that if kids are playing there then the parents should be able to keep an eye on them in a moment’s notice. This way the television is also more advertised so visitors walking through can’t miss it.
I think that this method of thinking really differentiates designers from architects, as it goes beyond the understanding of the exterior and standard sizes for certain spaces and instead thinks about the experience that a space can bring, being mindful of things like lighting, orientation, decoration, and an overall narrative that a space is meant to convey. While I do think that some aspects of being an Environments designer involve things that architects do, I think that Environments goes beyond the physical specifications of the space and begins to think about the digital, the emotional, and the experiential.
VR Interaction Story-boarding
LittleBits Exhibit Prototype
Final Exhibit
In my final exhibit, I made some changes to enhance the experience walking through the space to be more welcoming:
- Wood flooring in the entryway to be more inviting and transition better to the rest of the space
- Introducing the Children’s Museum at the beginning so that the visitor is made aware of the main exhibit at the start and end of the exhibit
- Decreasing the text size of the quotes to be easier to read at actual scale
- Adding some set pieces from the show like the rug and the window to feel like you’re walking through Mister Rogers home set
- Improving the craft in my seating area by making it all foam
- Changing the television space walls to an image of the neighborhood to feel more playful and like you’re entering the Land of Make-Believe
- Introducing more “Picture Picture” spaces to see highlights of Mister Rogers’ television career (with Jeff Erlanger, a disabled young boy; sharing a foot bath with Officer Clemmons as a stand against segregation; talking about death in a real yet thoughtful way, and ending with a message from Mister Rogers to his viewers at the end of his career saying how proud he is of the person that he/she has become)
- Adding footprints in front of the “Picture Picture” pieces to show where to stand to hear the sound spotlights and trigger the video to begin
- Moving the section about puppets to the television section to be more intuitive as an experience
- Improving the craft in the table at the end to fit more with the dark wood theme and show the decoration stage of the card takeaways
Final Reflection
My main motivation in design is finding a way to help people in a way that they may not be able to do on their own. The opportunity to help someone in need and use my gifts and talents is one of the most rewarding thing I feel that I can do, so being presented with that opportunity really allows me to feel engaged and focused.
This Mister Rogers exhibit was most exciting for me when I was able to consider the human experience and come up with small ways to make them feel special or to improve their experience, as I think that is its own way of helping people by bringing joy into their lives. The television interaction was the most satisfying part of the project for me personally as I was able to picture myself as a visitor within the exhibit or a child stumbling across the scene and experiencing the magic of seeing a toy in your hand appear on screen. I feel that the interaction is the most cohesive way to understand and enrich the experience of watching Mister Rogers through technology, without going overboard as his work was generally low-tech. The combination of some existing part of experiencing Mister Rogers (sitting in front of the television or watching the “Picture Picture” segment) with a more high-tech integration methods with sensors and motion activation in a way that feels like magic and instills wonder and curiosity fits in perfectly with the theme of the show.
Moving forward, I think I would try not to get too distracted by the little things in my exhibit to allow me to focus more on the bigger picture of my exhibit. I think I focused a lot on taking care to the dimensions that we were working within to take human proportions into account (making 1.5 pt body text at that, when at actual size, it would be the size of a short description next to an art piece, evaluating readability heights for walls, proportions of the craft table at the end of the exhibit, etc.) that it came at the cost of some of the bigger issues in my exhibit, like the tension between the exhibit feeling like a home and feeling like an exhibit creating conflicting moods, adding set pieces from the home of Mister Rogers creating a feeling of being in the show while risking coming across as less home-like and real.
This exhibit meant a lot to me as Mister Rogers has a large impact on my mom, and I learned most things about him from her initially. After watching the documentary on him, “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”, however, I really got a better understanding that the person behind the how was just as kindhearted, understanding, and welcoming as the “character” he played on the show. My main hope with the exhibit is that viewers would walk away with at least some better understanding of who Mister Rogers was, beyond the sweaters and sneakers.
