Designing for the museum: how can universities train prospective interior designers and successfully face the 21st century challenges?

Far from being static and isolated organizations, museums are living institutions which actively contribute to the beat of society. If their role as keepers of collections remains essential, it is undeniable that in the last decades museums have undertaken a deep transformative process, progressively becoming open platforms that not only focus on curatorial and conservation practices, but are more and more committed to the engagement of different audiences and stakeholders. More specifically, museums are now conceived as discursive spaces dialoguing with the visitor, where a meaningful exchange is encouraged through the provision of immersive, emotionally engaging and ultimately memorable experiences. It thus seems reasonable to forecast that in the upcoming future there will be an ever growing need to develop appropriate on-site communication strategies able to captivate visitors’ multiple interests, and that in this scenario exhibit and interior design will play a role that will progressively become more and more important. In this framework, which are the skills that will be required to prospective exhibit and interior designers desiring to actively contribute to this transformative process? How can academic courses and professional training initiatives shape educational paths that will lead architects and other specialists operating in the cultural field to successfully face these new challenges?