Video description: Visitors interact with museum exhibits, including blowing into a device to clean a projected riverscape, tracing the path of a glowing river on a wall map, and matching pucks with information about the water cycle on them to an illustration. Visitors dance and celebrate successfully cleaning up the projected river.
The Independence Seaport Museum
The Independence Seaport Museum explores the Delaware River's unique maritime history and culture. For its new exhibit, developed in partnership with Habithèque, Bluecadet combined education and play to make learning about the local watershed engaging for kids.
Creating a friendly brand
Our style guide for River Alive includes a hand-painted font, logo, and color palette that establishes a kid-friendly, approachable tone for the exhibit and its marketing materials.
Video description: Kids use various interactive tools to activate a curved display showing an animated river ecosystem — healthy with fish and wildlife, then polluted.
The Continuum Wall
The Continuum Wall uses interactive sensors and various haptic interfaces. Visitors blow, spin, and drum to clean the digital waters of a 32-foot projection of the watershed and meet the friendly creatures that call it home.
Video description: Animated sequence showing the branding for "River Alive!" — the logo animates onto a light blue background, followed by a close-up of an eel, then a pastel color palette reveal.
Video description: A user turns a physical dial at the River Alive! exhibit to control a large display. Onscreen is text stating that eels that hatch in the ocean must return to the river.
Video description: Animated showcase of River Alive! creatures: a frog sitting, a swallow in flight zooming closer, a fiddler crab waving its oversized claw, a trout, and a white butterfly in flight.
Visitors can also join together, collaborating to clean up the river and create a healthy habitat for the aquatic animals. When they succeed, they collectively trigger a celebration mode: music and a delightful, colorful display with dancing trees and flowers.
River Health Interactive
A multi-user touchscreen teaches kids about the river’s health through engaging activities and interactive animations.
Video description: Kids interact with a large touchscreen, exploring river threats like deforestation and salinity changes, while a separate kiosk covers dissolved oxygen.
River Map
Set into a larger map of the watershed, a touchscreen takes visitors on an in-depth journey through the river’s history.
Video description: Visitors explore a Delaware Watershed exhibit — through a large interactive map and a kiosk.
Personality River Quiz
Our personality quiz connects visitors to the watershed by matching them with their “River Hero” and related local organizations.
Video description: Visitors use touchscreen kiosks — a child taps an underwater scene, while two other visitors choose how to take action for the river (i.e., either create something or join a community project).
Exhibition Graphics
In developing the exhibition graphics, we blended a custom font, illustrated animals, and colorful photographs to balance scientific content, setting a playful yet educational tone for the exhibit.
Video description: A wide-angle tour of the River Alive! museum exhibit — curved walls journey from Mountains & Headwaters through Urban & Suburban to Bay & Coastal Plains, with live tanks, a water cycle kiosk, and the Delaware Watershed map.
Prototyping as process
Testing with stakeholders and intended audiences, whenever possible, is a valuable part of our process. When we were concepting for this exhibition, we held a prototyping session with students to test out some of the physical experiences and digital inputs, to better understand flow and pain points, before making the interactives a reality.
Video description: Kids enthusiastically test and discuss prototypes of interactives (including a glowing touch-activated sensor) in the River Alive! Exhibit. They also write and draw stories on paper circles, then stick them onto a watershed map alongside facts.
Awards & Press
Comm Arts
2019 Featured Exhibit
WHYY
Substantive coverage of project opening highlighting the institutional shift toward science-forward interactive experiences
American Alliance of Museums
2019 Special Achievement Award for Interactivity
Creative Partners
Habithèque
Hands on! Studio
Handymakes Studio
Creative Machines
Frazer Technology
B Fabrication
Explore More
Video description: Children in the Met 81st gallery interact with museum exhibits by turning a dial, moving colorful imagery around on a large projection, drumming, and tapping on a touchscreen.
Video description: Visitors activate selections on a touchtable, choose words from a tray to create their own message, and touch a button to begin an animated projection.