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Creating Curiosity. Delivering Impact.

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Delivering Impact.
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Canada

1867 Yonge Street
Suite 1100
Toronto, ON
M4S 1Y5
+1 416.480.2020

United States

530 Seventh Avenue
M2 - Unit 20
New York, NY
10018
+1 212.283.3030

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Canada

1867 Yonge Street
Suite 1100
Toronto, ON
M4S 1Y5
+1 416.480.2020

United States

530 Seventh Avenue
M2 - Unit 20
New York, NY
10018
+1 212.283.3030

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

Royal Tyrrell Museum: Learning Lounge

Overview

The Hands-On Learning Lounge is an interactive, energetic social space and discovery gallery which invites visitors to experience its charismatic star, a life-sized bronze cast of Albertosaurus.

Details

Client
Royal Tyrrell Museum
Project
Hands-On Learning Lounge
Size
2,000 sq. ft.
Scope
Exhibit Design - Children, Exhibit Design - Nature
Location
Drumheller, AB, CA
Year Completed
2019

The
Goal

Visitor feedback was instrumental in creating this new type of family oriented hands-on learning lounge. The Museum asked R&P to develop a space with more hands-on experiences, more rest spaces and incorporate a café lounge within the galleries. Touch-based interactive activities were to be incorporated throughout, and participation encouraged. A key goal was to reward visitors’ engagement and support repeat visitation and reinforce scientific concepts learned in the adjacent collections galleries in an approachable and enjoyable way.

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

The
Design

The Learning Lounge encourages self-directed, interactive discovery for all ages. The star of the Lounge is a life-sized, tactile bronze cast of Albertosaurus, a genus of a Cretaceous tyrannosaur that lived in western North America (now Alberta, Canada). R&P designed this feature display to allow visitors to engage with this dinosaur in a new way. Through a raised platform and glass-topped crawl-through space that sits below the entire form of this lumbering creature, visitors can see this skeleton from multiple vantage points while pretending to escape from this apex predator.

What sets the Learning Lounge apart from other galleries is the dynamic mix of content inspired by the preceding ‘Journey Through Time’ galleries, where visitors apply their newly acquired knowledge by exploring the interactive exhibits. Bold graphics draw visitors into this space and interactive settings

invite them to compare anatomy between dinosaurs and modern species. In ‘DinoRace’, visitors select specific dinosaurs and test their mobility and speed. ‘Build-a-Dinosaur’ explores anatomy where visitors discover movement and morphology, and can try to invent a new type of dinosaur. Dinosaur Augmented Reality Viewers provide a chance to journey directly into the landscape of Cretaceous Alberta and experience the amazing range of species that virtually surround them.

The Learning Lounge is a new type of gallery—a social space, a café and a learning experience, as well as a space that invites previously separate and often incompatible activities to happily co-exist. The gallery places the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology at the forefront of innovation.

The
Result

The result is a space that is airy, bold, welcoming, and entirely unique to the Royal Tyrrell Museum. The Learning Lounge is also fully accessible and family-friendly, appealing to all ages. It is a place to rest and reflect, eat and explore.

The intensive development process included workshops and drop-ins with Museum executives and the board of directors, corporate sponsors, Museum curatorial, programming and education staff, volunteers, Museum members/visitors, and external advisory groups.

Royal Tyrrell Museum: Learning Lounge

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

Details

Client
Royal Tyrrell Museum
Project
Hands-On Learning Lounge
Size
2,000 sq. ft.
Scope
Exhibit Design - Children, Exhibit Design - Nature
Location
Drumheller, AB, CA
Year Completed
2019

Overview

The Hands-On Learning Lounge is an interactive, energetic social space and discovery gallery which invites visitors to experience its charismatic star, a life-sized bronze cast of Albertosaurus.

The
Goal

Visitor feedback was instrumental in creating this new type of family oriented hands-on learning lounge. The Museum asked R&P to develop a space with more hands-on experiences, more rest spaces and incorporate a café lounge within the galleries. Touch-based interactive activities were to be incorporated throughout, and participation encouraged. A key goal was to reward visitors’ engagement and support repeat visitation and reinforce scientific concepts learned in the adjacent collections galleries in an approachable and enjoyable way.

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

The
Design

The Learning Lounge encourages self-directed, interactive discovery for all ages. The star of the Lounge is a life-sized, tactile bronze cast of Albertosaurus, a genus of a Cretaceous tyrannosaur that lived in western North America (now Alberta, Canada). R&P designed this feature display to allow visitors to engage with this dinosaur in a new way. Through a raised platform and glass-topped crawl-through space that sits below the entire form of this lumbering creature, visitors can see this skeleton from multiple vantage points while pretending to escape from this apex predator.

What sets the Learning Lounge apart from other galleries is the dynamic mix of content inspired by the preceding ‘Journey Through Time’ galleries, where visitors apply their newly acquired knowledge by exploring the interactive exhibits. Bold graphics draw visitors into this space and interactive settings

invite them to compare anatomy between dinosaurs and modern species. In ‘DinoRace’, visitors select specific dinosaurs and test their mobility and speed. ‘Build-a-Dinosaur’ explores anatomy where visitors discover movement and morphology, and can try to invent a new type of dinosaur. Dinosaur Augmented Reality Viewers provide a chance to journey directly into the landscape of Cretaceous Alberta and experience the amazing range of species that virtually surround them.

The Learning Lounge is a new type of gallery—a social space, a café and a learning experience, as well as a space that invites previously separate and often incompatible activities to happily co-exist. The gallery places the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology at the forefront of innovation.

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology

The
Result

The result is a space that is airy, bold, welcoming, and entirely unique to the Royal Tyrrell Museum. The Learning Lounge is also fully accessible and family-friendly, appealing to all ages. It is a place to rest and reflect, eat and explore.

The intensive development process included workshops and drop-ins with Museum executives and the board of directors, corporate sponsors, Museum curatorial, programming and education staff, volunteers, Museum members/visitors, and external advisory groups.

Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
Photos courtesy of the ©Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology
ProjectsRoyal Tyrrell Museum: Learning Lounge