When the design for your whatsis — museum, experience, wall, interactive software — is cluttered, you have two options. Last time we covered Option 1: Reduce. The second option is not for the faint of heart. But it’s my favorite.

Ever been in a situation where the design for your museum, exhibition, experience, wall — let’s say whatsis — is cluttered? It’s unclear and overstuffed. Exhibitions are particularly clutter-prone. What to do? You have two options.

What’s the best way to organize the content in our experiences? What if you learned there were five ways to do it — and only five? Host Jonathan Alger (C&G Partners) does a solo podcast on “L.A.T.C.H.”, the framework proposed by TED founder Richard Saul Wurman.

PHIL: I have to cut part of my project. MONIQUE: [Looks for barista] Why? PHIL: Out of time. MONIQUE: Why? PHIL: We didn’t have costs until now. MONIQUE: Why? PHIL: [Furrows brow] We didn’t get them estimated yet. MONIQUE: Why? PHIL: [Annoyed] We could only do it at the end! And why do you keep saying why?

(Time — the “T” in L.A.T.C.H. — is one of the five fundamental organizing principles of exhibitions. See them all here.) Chronology is a common exhibition structure. But there are more twists on it than you think. Here are five:

SEGD, the Society of Experiential Graphic Design, was kind enough to interview me about Making the Museum in their weekly newsletter and blog just now. A big thank you to SEGD — and for permission to reprint it here. (This will be longer than the usual one-minute read.)

Quick, what’s your new exhibition based on?
A. Thing-based
B. Idea-based
C. Wait, is this a trick question?

Is everything “phygital”? How can a “phygital mindset” lead to better experience design? Exhibition designer and “phygital architect” Alin Tocmacov joins host Jonathan Alger to hash out some key principles, in “8 Ways to Be Phygital”.

We could pack endless content into our experiences … but people can’t absorb that. A single idea in a gallery is powerful … but that’s not efficient. How do we find balance? Here’s a loose rule of thumb: One idea per surface, at most.

My research prep for an appearance on a podcast became ten insights that changed how I think. Here are the last five. — #6. Any new space is immersive. Any time we are “dipped” into new “fluid” we are immersed. New surroundings demand attention.

We all either love "immersive" — or are fed up with it. Or both. The inimitable Charlie Morrow invited me on his podcast, "Immerse!", which is about ... you know. I did some prep research. I found ten ideas that changed how I think about what I do.

Walt Disney’s new theme park needed new experiences that could market themselves to visitors. Touring the property, his dog was a reluctant companion. Walt lured him along with cocktail sausages. Where a “weenie” was, his dog was sure to go. And inspiration struck.

Is lighting art or science? About light, or about shadows? Lighting designers Steven Rosen and Ted Mather (Available Light) join host Jonathan Alger (C&G Partners) on Making the Museum, the podcast, to discuss Revealing the Story with Light.

PHIL: Sorry I’m late, I was on Zoom doing some painstorming. MONIQUE: You mean brainstorming. PHIL: What? No, I mean painstorming. MONIQUE: … PHIL: [Smiles] You’ve never heard of it! MONIQUE: What? Well, no, I mean … OK, I haven’t heard of it.

“People always ask me for a boat,” a designer friend once said to me. “I wish they would just ask for a way to get across the river.” We all get two types of requests. Type 1: A problem in search of a solution. Type 2: A solution in search of a problem.

Lots of cultural project teams come up with lots of great ideas, have no idea what it will all cost, and wait until some milestone down the road to get a price check from … somebody. Is it any surprise when the estimate comes back crazy high, and the budget axe comes out?

You might say your museum is a key voice in the fight for biodiversity. But if your visitors tell other people it’s boring, that’s what it is. You might say it’s the first art museum where visitors make the art. But if your visitors say all the interactives are broken, that’s what it is.

How do we keep cultural projects from going off the rails, without sacrificing creativity? It’s not impossible. Media design expert Trent Oliver joins host Jonathan Alger on Making the Museum, the podcast, to discuss the Secrets of Creative Collaboration.

MONIQUE: That exhibition this morning felt like a $1 show. PHIL: Were we on the same tour? That felt like $5,000,000. MONIQUE: Exactly. [Eats blueberry.] PHIL: What? MONIQUE: You were thinking total cost. I was thinking cost per visitor.

Now here’s a crazy thought: an exhibition is a communication medium you can walk through. Unlike almost any other channel of communication, exhibitions are dimensional. And the audience is physically inside the channel. (Take that, Netflix.)