Pre-visit information is key

Let’s start at the beginning: the visitor experience commences way before someone enters the venue; 91% of visitors with accessibility requirements will look for information on your inclusive features and facilities before deciding to visit (Euan’s Guide, 2023) so providing them with honest, up to date information is crucial. This should take several forms: could you provide a familiarisation video (with captions) as well as an access guide that states things like access route widths and reach range heights? What about a visual story of the visitor journey, alongside a sensory map that rates the likelihood of crowds, noise, smells and certain lighting levels? Wellcome Collection’s ‘Being Human’ exhibition provides excellent pre-visit information for those with a range of accessibility requirements. Providing both a phone number and email address for visitors to get in contact should they have further questions is also key - not everyone will feel comfortable with picking up the phone, or be able to.

Do you want to be truly aspirational in your approach? On arrival at your exhibition, visitors should ideally be able to engage with an Access Hub, where alternative format guides, a tactile map and British Sign Language (BSL) welcome, portable seats and ear defenders are all available. 

Consider your representation

We all like to see ourselves represented as a potential visitor, colleague or audience member - it makes us feel welcomed and like a particular exhibition, film or even job role is for us. The same principle absolutely applies to culture and heritage venues, so make sure that those with accessibility requirements, and just as importantly those who identify with the nine protected characteristics under the Equality Act, 2010 (including age, sex, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, and gender reassignment) are well represented in your event advertisements, but also on interpretation labels within your galleries. That doesn’t just mean ‘we’ll show a wheelchair user and that’ll do’ - what about a pregnant wheelchair user, family members from mixed ethnic backgrounds, those with cochlear implants, visitors wearing the Sunflower lanyard or ear defenders, or visitors navigating through the space with an assistance dog?

Think about Spoon Theory

Whilst it is widely understood that not every impairment or access requirement is visible, it’s often not obvious how to best consider - and design for - those with non-visible disabilities, be they permanent, temporary or situational, and physical, sensory or cognitive. In 2003, Christine Miserando coined the term ‘Spoon Theory’, which focuses on those who may have limited energy resources, or ‘spoons’ to utilise on a daily basis. If certain tasks, like getting dressed and taking public transport, are likely to cost more ‘spoons’, it’s therefore vital that the visitor and colleague experience within your exhibition provides pleasant and efficient dwell opportunities. The location of these should be well-considered: ideally in a quieter area but not completely removed from the action, with calming but contrasting colour palettes to encourage decompression but also ease of navigation and identification. Inclusively designed seating should provide back and armrests and allow lateral transfer space for wheelchair users, and elements such as charging capabilities should be considered to minimise that sense of panic if directional maps are relied on, for example.

Engage with lived experience

You could read all the inclusive design standards and best practice guidance out there and become very well-versed in what you need to do to provide and promote an accessible and inclusive exhibition in the technical sense. Access routes could be designed to be wide enough for two wheelchair users to pass each other, the implementation of quiet spaces could be prioritised alongside the visual contrast and reach ranges of interactives, and you might even start looking at Changing Places installation. All fantastic, and much needed.

However, those documents won’t tell you about the hugely positive impact that such additions make to a visitor experience, build your empathy surrounding clashing requirements and the need to find design compromise, or tell you that ‘the font used in that interpretation - even though it aligns with technical guidance - doesn’t work for me in practice’; only those with lived experience can do that. Engage with them, co-create something brilliant, and vitally, pay them for their time and expertise.

We have extensive experience in working with lived experience users within culture and heritage and live events projects. We work with those from existing organisations such as the brilliant Snappy Trust based in York, and recruit and facilitate user groups made up of local, national and international members as we have done for National Science and Media Museum and COP28.

Empower your staff members

When thinking about building staff confidence and capability in the realm of accessibility and inclusive design, it’s important that your workforce have the opportunity to gain knowledge surrounding disability and other protected characteristics, as well as interact and work with those with lived experience. A truly inclusive exhibition has elevated its efforts in terms of inclusive internal cultures, and provides opportunities for diverse engagement and leadership to shine from the inside-out. Curating for Change is a wonderful example of this.

Focus on opportunities for collaboration

One of the brilliant things about interactive exhibits, in particular, is their ability to encourage collaboration between those with and without accessibility requirements. Can an intricate pulley system be connected to a push button, for example, so that both can be used to achieve the same outcome? Inclusion doesn’t ever have to mean less interesting or challenging, nor should it! In popular galleries with films, interactives and lots of ‘actionable elements’, it is also important to think about ease of identification and use; as a ‘quick win’ that makes all the difference, perhaps every point of visitor interaction on an exhibit - be it a lever, push button or wheel - could be coded in the same colour to enable visitors to hone in on elements of activity and fun. We were the accessibility consultants for Wonderlab: The Bramall Gallery, where this process worked brilliantly (we also implemented floor graphics encouraging ‘permissive play’ and connecting exhibits to their interpretation!)

And lastly, the term ‘fully accessible’ does not exist

With the very best of intentions, it is almost impossible to make every single element of an exhibition or interactive gallery equally accessible to all - but this does provide an opportunity to think creatively! Can a very visual exhibit be supported by a touch object for those who are blind or partially sighted, or might there be ways to use a soundtrack to share information (noting that this should not cause distress to neurodivergent visitors and staff members)?

We believe exhibitions can be exciting, aspirational and inclusive and would love to support you on your journey to making this happen. Should you be interested in finding out more, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Written by:

Emily Yates
Head of Accessibility and Inclusive Design

Emily has worked on numerous accessibility initiatives for national and international organisations, including the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro and Heathrow Airport. Emily has also worked with the Council of Europe and sat on equality boards advising premier league football clubs.

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