Memorial & Museum Experience Design

National September 11 Memorial & Museum

Overview

Ensuring that as 9/11 passes into history, it remains a deeply human experience.

When the museum opened, its primary role was to help the world process a raw, collective trauma. Today, its mission has evolved: it must transmit that memory to a generation that never saw the towers fall. To ensure the tragedy doesn't fade into abstract history, we rejected the traditional curatorial voice in favor of a massive oral history platform. By building the experience entirely from first-person accounts–from survivors, first responders, and witnesses–we ensured that even as the event passes into history, the human feeling of that September morning remains immediate, visceral, and impossible to forget.

Partners

Thinc Design, Layman Design, Electrosonic, Underground Audio, NowArchival

“Spare and elegant, enveloping visitors with the personal accounts of people.”

The Wall Street Journal

When the museum opened, its primary role was to help the world process a raw, collective trauma. Today, its mission has evolved: it must transmit that memory to a generation that never saw the towers fall. To ensure the tragedy doesn't fade into abstract history, we rejected the traditional curatorial voice in favor of a massive oral history platform. By building the experience entirely from first-person accounts–from survivors, first responders, and witnesses–we ensured that even as the event passes into history, the human feeling of that September morning remains immediate, visceral, and impossible to forget.

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