What if together we could solve humanity’s greatest challenges…
Rethinking the role of the senses in museums
Sensation:
Designing for all five senses
Tools:
Practical strategies for real change
Collaboration:
Research and practice in partnership
Reflection:
Changing how we work
The Sensational Museum is a pioneering research project radically reimagining the role of the senses in museums. Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and led by an interdisciplinary team of academics and practitioners, the project challenges conventional assumptions about access by placing sensory experience at the heart of interpretation and display.
As a core partner, Barker Langham helped shape and implement new models for what a truly inclusive museum experience might look like – where accessibility is not an add-on, but a shared foundation for engagement for everyone.
Sensation:
Designing for all five senses
At the centre of the project was a shift away from visual dominance – looking and reading – as the default mode of engagement. The team worked to create new trans-sensory approaches that could engage visitors through touch, scent, movement, temperature and more. These methods were developed using what we know about disability and access to change how museums work for everyone.
Working across seven museums in the UK, we co-designed interventions with disabled collaborators. The participants defined the stories they wanted to explore, and we worked with them to develop sensory responses tailored to their brief – designing, producing and installing experiences that were creative, genuinely multisensory and grounded in lived experience.
Tools:
Practical strategies for real change
Barker Langham advised on the development of a trans-sensory co-creation toolkit, produced in collaboration with the academic team. The toolkit supports museums of any size to develop their own ‘sensational’ interventions. We focused on ensuring that the methodology could move beyond theory into practical application – scalable, adaptable and usable across a range of contexts.
Collaboration:
Research and practice in partnership
The Sensational Museum is as much about sector-wide transformation as it is about individual interventions. Together with our partners, we’ve presented findings at conferences, led sessions for museum designers, and contributed to publications across the cultural sector. This collaboration between research and practice has helped ensure the project’s outcomes are widely shared and meaningfully applied.
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Reflection:
Changing how we work
Being part of The Sensational Museum has had a lasting impact on our own practice. It has challenged us to think differently about accessible design, deepened our approach to co-creation, and prompted us to rethink how we communicate ideas with clarity and care. It’s a project that has reshaped not only how museums might work – but how we work, too.
