Co-creating the new entrance at the Vasa Museum
Background: Many things have changed since the Vasa Museum was build in 1987, today Sweden's most visited museum. The museum has since seen a continuously increase of the amount of visitors, a more digitally mature public and a different security situation in the society. Hence, the museum is faced with new expectations and requirements that needs to be met in order to create a good and safe museum experience. In 2016 the Vasa Museum consulted Expedition Mondial in a service design project where the scope was to look at the holistic visitor experience of the museum. The entrance area was distinguished as highly important, as it plays a central role for the visitor both in the beginning, during and in the end of a visit to the museum as well is a work space for many of the employees of the museum. Together with the National Property Board of Sweden (SFV) and the house architect Pär Ahlbom, the Vasa Museum therefore decided to reconstruct the entrance at the museum. Expedition Mondial was hired to make an evaluation of the suggested alternatives for a new entrance, based on the experience, needs and challenges of both visitors and employees.
The purpose of reconstructing the entrance area is for the museum to achieve a better visitor flow with good accessibility, a pleasant work environment and a high degree of security. Within this project, the purpose of the evaluation was for the museum to understand how the different entrance alternatives, given by SFV and the house architect, was affecting and contributing to the experience of the main stakeholders (visitors and employees). Also to ensure that no significant needs where discarded and that the employees were engaged and involved in the co-creation process.
The project resulted in a co-created need analysis of the suggested alternatives, together with the employees, management and visitors at the Vasa Museum. The need analysis resulted in a suggested concept for the new entrance, accentuating guiding principles and stakeholder needs that a new entrance is proposed to meet in order to achieve a positive and improved visitor and employee experience. The visual need analysis and concept were given to the museum as a base for their continuous decision making process together with SFV and the house architect, on how to go forward in the project.
