NATIONAL SEPTEMBER 11TH MEMORIAL AND MUSEUM | 9/11 Memorial Museum Exhibition Design | 2015
The Museum That Never Ends / 9/11 Memorial Museum
70 feet below Ground Zero, there's a museum. But it's not a "finished" museum. As Jake Barton of Local Projects put it: "It doesn't need to be finished. It can be an experience that keeps changing."
The problem
When the design team set out to create a place to hold the memory of 9/11, they decided not to tell a single "official story." That's because that day was experienced by countless people, in countless places, each in their own way.
The insight
So why not just gather all those countless perspectives as they are? The idea was to turn the museum into a place where people could tell their own stories.
The idea
The first exhibit, "We Remember," is about 30 meters long and uses 6 projectors and 16 speakers to recreate the moment the world learned about 9/11. Beyond it sits a recording booth, where visitors can record their own story for three minutes. More than 8,000 recordings have been collected so far, and they're projected onto the Slurry Wall. The moment the exhibition is finished, it changes again, a little, with someone else's voice.
What happened
Within nine months of opening, more than 2 million people had visited, and the museum received multiple awards, including the Excellence in Exhibition award and a MUSE Award.
Afterthought
With ads and campaigns, we're always tempted to set an ending. But the things that really matter never end. Not as long as people keep telling their stories, not as long as they keep being remembered. Right now, somewhere underground, someone is recording their own story. And the museum will change, just a little, once again.
Awards
- Cannes Lions Gold 2015
