Home Port Philadelphia
Independence Seaport Museum, Philadelphia, PA
MDA designed all opening exhibits for the Museum’s new location at Penn’s Landing. The main exhibit Home Port Philadelphia tells the history of the city’s industrial waterfront and its impact on the growth of Philadelphia. An extensive collection of paintings, ephemera, ship models, tools, and other objects are integrated into environments combined with media: steerage bunks with audio accounts of the journey, an immigration station with video selections depicting stories of emigration to Philadelphia, a recreation of the USS Lawrence destroyer bridge, and a shipyard drafting room with a touchscreen database on locally-built ships. Interactives include computer games on commerce, loading a container ship, rowing on the Schuylkill, navigational signals, and “reeling” in fish to learn about the environmental effects of industry.
MDA provided concept through final design, prepared bid documents and negotiated services for ten subcontractors, advised the project architect on building renovations, and supervised audiovisual and exhibit fabrication firms during production and installation.
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