Interactive Media Installations

City of Hope

Duarte, CA

Sharing stories of innovation, healing, and soul via a uniquely expressive digital installation.

The Ask

Use digital storytelling to chronicle the history, science, people and technology that have made City of Hope one of the leading medical institutions in the world.

The Journey

In keeping with the goal of creating a contemplative space to learn and reflect, design visitor-friendly experiences that highlight the interconnectedness of the City of Hope’s achievements, doctors and patients, and create a system to share and celebrate messages of hope from patients and family.

The Solution

Three large-format touchscreen interactive inspire visitors with success stories, an origami-inspired "wishing tree" visualizes well-wishes from around the globe, and a glowing "connective tissue" wraps the experience in a warm embrace. The solutions illustrate the cancer care and research hospital’s pillars of its legacy: innovation, healing, and soul. Produced In partnership with Gallagher & Associates.

A shot looking into the museum showing the digital exhibits on the sculptural form.

Following a thread through interconnected stories of hope.

The first interactive exhibit is a touchscreen-based, non-linear narrative. Visitors are exposed to a variety of stories via self-discovery, semantic relationships and user-generated content.

The interface is designed to highlight the interconnectedness of the City of Hope’s achievements, doctors and patients, expressing the organization’s holistic and integrated approach to research and medicine. Fluid animations and minimalist controls push content to the forefront to heighten longer-form engagements.

Three large-format, dual-display stations provide access to hundreds of stories. The stories and media are managed by a cloud-hosted CMS.

Visitors to the City of Hope Museum learn more about the organization's pioneering care through a series of large-format interactive touchscreens. Content is cross-referenced for enhanced storytelling by docents.
The interactive sculpture features an interactive LED light installation that reacts to visitor input on the touchscreens.

The curvilinear structure is wrapped with a smart light mesh that reacts to visitors' content choices.

A closer-view of the reactive LED light installation.

A Warm Digital Embrace

Around the sinuous exterior of the sculpture is a fabric of sprawling reactive LED sculptures. Custom software developed by Stimulant drives these lighting modules with flowing generative artwork.

These fixtures bring the visual language of the physical interactive exhibit design to life in a subtle, playful way and add a luminous, calming effect to the space.

A photo of two visitors contemplating the social media data visualization projected onto the wall.

In the heart of the sculpture is a reflection room, where a digital data visualization of messages of hope takes the form of an origami tree.

Sharing Sentiments and Love

On the inside of the sculptural form, a virtual “wishing tree” is covered in wishes for healing and hope. The tree interactive exhibit is a real-time visualization of wishes that have been added by visitors to the museum via a mobile website and by online guests at hopeful.org. Each leaf on the tree is a single wish. As a result, the tree grows larger and more complex over time as new wishes are added.

Visitors can sit in quiet contemplation on a bench inside the meditative space of the sculpture and watch as the visualization displays individual wishes one at a time on the big screen. The fully generative systems that power these experiences bring insight and hope to patients, their visitors, donors, and guests.

A closer view of the animated social media data visualization.