Arcade has been named as the winner of StoryFutures’ latest StoryLab commission.
StoryLabs are open innovation events that fund exploratory work in immersive storytelling, with previous StoryLab partners including Heathrow Airport, the Discovery Channel and the Roald Dahl Story Company. This £170,000 commission saw the return of The National Gallery for their second StoryLab, this time looking for a partner to develop a child-led immersive experience for 7-11 year olds, focusing on ‘the art and science of nature’. As an additional twist, the brief includes a focus on exporting the experience to China, with the potential to install an adapted version at a cultural institution in Shanghai.
This incredibly competitive process initially saw Arcade named as one of four shortlisted teams who all took part in the three-day StoryLab experience itself, including a series of fascinating creative and technical sessions and even an opportunity to run some rapid focus groups with the target audience of Year 4-6 primary school children! A mere week later, the teams watched each other pitch, and we were thrilled to learn we had been selected as the winning team.
“We feel incredibly honoured to have been entrusted with this opportunity,” said Arcade CEO Jon Meggitt, “R&D projects always brings inherent uncertainty and risk, but there’s no doubt in our minds that we will deliver something astonishing for these world renowned institutions and their audiences, and repay the trust they have placed in us.”
Designing with and for children is always hugely enjoyable and rewarding. It does also bring certain challenges, but these will be nothing new for the Arcade team, having recently launched the MunchMunch creativity tool for Norwegian school children with the MUNCH Museum; brought Year 4 kids’ monsters to life in The Museum of the Imagination, part of the Camden People’s Museum; and developed Roxy the Ranger to engage kids and their families at SEA LIFE’s London Aquarium. We look forward to applying everything we have learned through these projects, but also to learning so much more from our partners and, in particular, the young co-creators we will work with along the way.
The project is due to launch in Q1 2022, so an intensive 10 months await – wish us luck!
