Museum Recognized for Dress Design Interactive

The Chicago History Museum is pleased to announce that it is a recipient of a 2017 MUSE Award for “Design a Dress,” a projection mapping interactive that invites visitors to experience the thrill of being a designer.

“The intuitive interface invites visitors to explore exactly 276,480 possible combinations of fabric patterns, accents, bodice types, skirt lengths, and fabric colors until they are satisfied with their design,” said Tamara Biggs, Director of Exhibitions at the Chicago History Museum.

The award-winning interactive is currently on display in the Museum’s newest costume exhibition, “Making Mainbocher: The First American Couturier.”

The Chicago History Museum will be presented with a MUSE Award in the category Interactive Interpretive Installations during a champagne reception on Sunday, May 7, 2017, at the 2017 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting in St. Louis, Missouri. This award recognizes the Chicago History Museum’s high achievement in the application of media and technology to Gallery, Library, Archive, and Museum [GLAM] programs.

The MUSE Awards competition received more than 200 applications from a wide variety of institutions in North and South America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. This year’s entries included videos and films, interactive kiosks and installations, VR experiences, applications and APIs, digital communities, websites, audio tours and more.

Over 90 GLAM professionals from across the globe participated as jurors in the process of reviewing and scoring entries. Winning programs were expected to demonstrate outstanding achievement in their content, interface, design, technical merit, innovation, utility, and appeal.

Now in its 28th year, the MUSE awards competition recognizes outstanding achievement in GLAM media and technology efforts. The competition is administrated by the American Alliance of Museums Media & Technology Professional Network.

ABOUT THE CHICAGO HISTORY MUSEUM

The Chicago History Museum is situated on ancestral homelands of the Potawatomi people, who cared for the land until forced out by non-Native settlers. Established in 1856, the Museum is now at 1601 N. Clark Street in Lincoln Park, its third location. As a major museum and research center for Chicago and U.S. history, the Chicago History Museum strives to be a destination for learning, inspiration and civic engagement. Through dynamic exhibitions, tours, publications, special events and programming, the Museum connects people to Chicago’s history and to each other. To share Chicago stories, the Museum collects and preserves millions of artifacts, documents, images and other items that are relevant to the city’s history. The Museum gratefully acknowledges the support of the Chicago Park District on behalf of the people of Chicago.