National Museum of African American History & Culture
Telling Untold Stories
Challenge
From film screenings and evenings of music, comedy, or spoken word, to panel discussions on books and critical conversations by noted speakers, the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) holds a variety of public programs each month. At the beginning of this event series—when the Museum itself was brand new—we were asked to create a series of printed programs and event signage.
Approach
With NMAAHC staff, we first developed a list of event categories by thematically organizing the public programs. From this, we created a design system that uses color schemes and original icons to differentiate between types of events. Any event collateral, including programs and posters, adhere to this system. The layout of the program itself accommodates a variety of content, including images of objects from the museum collection that align with each event’s theme. Just like the events they tell about, the designed materials educate and inform museum visitors––and our hope is that they might also be considered keepsakes from the experience.
