New Year, New Exhibits Approaches
You know that exhibit in your museum? The one with the hand crank that stopped working last July? Or the touchscreen that's been displaying "Loading..." since Thanksgiving? Maybe it's the fabric panel that's faded to the point where visitors squint at it like they're deciphering ancient hieroglyphics.
We've all been there. January brings that fresh-start energy, and while you might be Marie Kondo-ing your sock drawer at home, it's also the perfect time to take an honest look at your exhibit floor.
The question isn't whether your exhibits need attention—they do. The real question is: what kind of attention do they need?
The Keep, Fix, or Farewell Framework
Think of this as triage for your museum floor. Not every exhibit problem requires the same solution, and treating them all the same way is how you end up either throwing away perfectly good exhibits or carrying dead weight.
Keep & Maintain: These are your workhorses. Visitors love them, they're holding up well, and they just need regular care. Oil the gears, replace the worn rope, refresh that label copy. This is routine maintenance, not crisis management.
Fix & Refresh: These exhibits still have good bones, but they need real intervention. Maybe the concept is solid, but the execution has worn thin. Maybe visitor behavior has changed since you installed it. These need intentional work, but they're worth saving.
Farewell & Replace: This is the "tough love" category. Some exhibits have simply run their course. The technology is obsolete, the maintenance burden is crushing your staff, or visitors just walk past it without a second glance.
Ask the Hard Questions
Before you decide which category each exhibit falls into, gather some real data:
Is it still being used as intended? Stand and watch for twenty minutes. Are visitors actually engaging with it, or just triggering it accidentally while reaching for the hand sanitizer dispenser?
What's the maintenance burden? Track how many staff hours per month go into keeping this thing functional. If your educator is spending five hours weekly unjamming the marble run, that's not an exhibit—that's a part-time job.
Does it still serve your visitors? Museums change, neighborhoods change, audiences change. An exhibit that worked brilliantly in 2015 might feel irrelevant now, and that's okay.
What would repair actually cost? Not just parts and materials—include staff time, opportunity cost, and the very real possibility that you'll be having this same conversation again in six months.
Low-Cost Refresh Strategies (My Favorite Part)
Here's where scrappy museum thinking really shines. You don't always need a capital campaign to breathe new life into an exhibit.
Surface Solutions: Sometimes it's as simple as replacing a worn tabletop, painting a scuffed frame, or recovering a cushion. Fresh surfaces signal "cared for" to visitors.
Graphics Refresh: New labels, updated colors, contemporary fonts. You'd be amazed at how much visual fatigue contributes to "exhibit invisibility." A $200 graphics order can make a five-year-old exhibit feel new.
Add Challenge Layers: Your gear table is fine, but visitors master it in thirty seconds. Add prompt cards with new challenges: "Can you make the gears spin backwards?" "Build the tallest tower that still turns." Fresh engagement without rebuilding anything.
Swap the Variables: Keep the structure, change what visitors manipulate. Your shadow wall works great—rotate which objects cast shadows with the seasons. Your water table is solid—swap out the boats for different designs every quarter.
Strategic Component Replacement: Replace just the tired piece while keeping everything else. The pulley system is great, but the buckets are cracked? New buckets are cheaper than a new exhibit.
Red flags that signal an exhibit needs to go:
- Repair costs approaching 60-70% of replacement cost
- Maintenance demands are preventing you from developing new work
- Safety concerns that can't be fixed without gutting the whole thing
- Visitor engagement has dropped to near zero despite refresh attempts
- The underlying concept no longer aligns with your mission
Decommissioning doesn't mean failure. It means you're making space for something better.
The graceful exit: Document what worked and what didn't. Photograph it. Save components that might be useful elsewhere. If it served visitors well for years, honor that. Then let it go.
Repurpose what you can: That sturdy frame might become your next exhibit's foundation. Those motors could drive something new. The plexiglass always has another use. Museums should be experts at adaptive reuse.
Make This Manageable
Don't try to evaluate your entire museum in one week. Pick a gallery or a zone. Spend an afternoon observing, taking notes, and being brutally honest. Then make decisions exhibit by exhibit.
Create three literal lists: Keep, Fix, Farewell. Assign realistic timelines. Fix doesn't mean "someday when we get a grant." It means Q2 2026 with a specific plan.
The museums that feel fresh and vital aren't necessarily the ones with the newest exhibits. They're the ones where someone is paying attention, making thoughtful decisions, and refusing to accept "that's just how it is" as an answer.
So walk your floor with fresh eyes this month. Your exhibits (and your visitors!) will thank you.
Paul Orselli writes the posts on ExhibiTricks. Paul likes to combine interesting people, ideas, and materials to make exhibits (and entire museums!) with his company POW! (Paul Orselli Workshop, Inc.) Let's work on a project together!
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