"So you're the one getting this gift? Lucky you!
Someone who knows you has visited the museum.
They searched out things they thought you would care about, and they took photos and left messages for you."

This is the welcoming message for the Gift app, designed to create a very personal museum visit. Hybrid Museum Experiences use new technologies to augment, expand or alter the physical experience of visiting the museum. They are designed to be experienced in close relation to the physical space and exhibit. In this book we discuss three forms of hybridity in museum experiences: Incorporating the digital and the physical, creating social, yet personal and intimate experiences, and exploring ways to balance visitor participation and museum curation.
This book reports on a 3-year cross-disciplinary research project in which artists, design researchers and museum professionals have collaborated to create technology-mediated experiences that merge with the museum environment.

Annika Waern is a 'research through design' academic who has been researching technology-supported physical play and games for about fifteen years. Currently, she is conducting research in the areas of hybrid play in museums, children’s play in outdoor settings, and circus training to foster proprioceptic skills.Anders Sundnes Lovlie does research on the intersection of design research and media studies, focusing in particular on experience design, locative media and play. Anders was the coordinator for the GIFT project, and has been involved in a number of design projects involving museums like the Munch Museum, Danish Architecture Center, the National Gallery of Denmark, Brighton Museum and the Frederiksberg Museums.

Preface (Kevin Bacon and Nikita Mathias)

Concepts

1. Introduction (Anders Sundnes Lovlie and Annika Waern)
Why hybrid museum experiences?
GIFT
The structure of this book

2. Hybrid Museum Experiences (Anders Sundnes Lovlie, Annika Waern, Lina Eklund, Jocelyn Spence, Paulina Rajkowska and Steve Benford)
The Physical and the Digital
The Personal and the Social
The Museum and the Visitor
Conclusions

Cases

3. The Gift App – Gifting Museum Experiences (Jocelyn Spence)
The Experience
The Designer Perspective
The Museum Perspective
The Visitor Perspective
Analysis of the Gift App
Conclusions

4. Never let me go – Social and Introspective Play (Karin Ryding)
Becoming Mouse: The Experience
Designing for Playfulness
Designing Never let me go
The Visitor Perspective
Analysis of Never Let Me Go
Conclusions

5. Your Stories – A Life Cycle Analysis (Paulina Rajkowska)
The National Museum of Serbia
The Design
The Design Process
Visitor Perspective
Museum Perspective
Designer Perspective
Analysis of Your Stories

Craft

6. Action Research as a Method for Reflective Practice in Museums (Christian Hviid Mortensen, Anne Rorbak Olesen, Sejul Malde and Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
Reflective Practice in Museums
What is Action Research?
Action Research in GIFT
The Cross-Departmental COP: Three Examples
The Cross-Organizational COP: Learning Beyond the Organization
The GIFT Project: A Cross-Sectorial COP
Discussion
Conclusions

7. Sensitizing Design Teams to Theory (Annika Waern and Paulina Rajkowska)
Sensitizing Concepts and Boundary Objects
Sensitizing Scenarios
Resident Theorist
Other Ways to Sensitize Designers

8. Ideation Tools for Experience Design (Anne Rorbak Olesen, Christian Hviid Mortensen, Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
The Importance of Ideation
Three Tools for Ideation
Combination and Usefulness of the Tools

9. Data-Driven Visiting Experiences (Steve Benford, Dimitri Darzentas, Edgar Bodiaj, Paul Tennent, Sarah Martindale, Harriet Cameron and Velvet Spors)
Visualizing Visitor Behaviour in Thresholds
Visiting Gifting Behaviours 162
Visualizing the Use of Visitor Box Cards
Opportunities and Challenges

10. Evaluation (Jon Back and Jocelyn Spence)
First, Ask Why!
What Is Important to Know?
Who Should Your Study Subjects Be?
Where Will You Be?
When and for How Long Can You Study Them?
How to Get Your Answer
Early On: Formative Studies
Analyse Your Evaluation
Ethical Considerations
Conclusions

Coda

11. Remediating, Reframing and Restaging the Museum (Annika Waern and Anders Sundnes Lovlie)
The Ideal Museum Experience
Reimagining the Museum Experience
Final Words

Bibliography
Index