Hospitality starts with a "smart" design!
The lobby sets a theater's style (like in a Russian proverb) as well as a museum's one. The entrance area is a place that creates the first impression and the atmosphere of comfort and hospitality! This space in the Museum of Fine Arts of Karelia has not changed for almost 20 years. And these changes were a great challenge for the project team and required a professional approach! Yana Permyakova, the Member of the Karelian Union of Designers, the Director of the Interior Design Center and creator of the Kareliandesign brand, was invited to create a design project for a visual navigation system and modernize the entrance area of the Museum.
A brainstorming sessions helped the team to identify problem areas and limited functionality of the navigation system of the museum and the museum lobby and made it possible to create a design project. First of all we took into consideration the trajectory of visitors' movements, the need for a particular zone and the availability of information, as well as the level of comfort, illumination, and color perception. An next thing was to improve the working conditions of museum employees working in the entrance area - an administrator, a cashier, a security guard and etc. In general, the main aim was to increase the tourist attractiveness, and to provide the museum guests with navigation and information accessibility.
As Yana Permyakova says, designing a public space is always very interesting, but at the same time it is doubly responsible! When you develop the interior of a private apartment, you satisfy the wishes of one specific customer, and when designing a museum, you are preparing to meet with the opinions of not only the museum team, but also the public.
Yana shared with us her impression of cooperation:
“It took me some time to get imbued with the history of this wonderful building, I learned a lot about it. I wanted the visitor to learn about this too, so we added a historical block to the navigation (and now the excursion for visitors can start right from the hall). Above the cashier area, we made an information block about the museum's collections, accompanied by inscriptions in English and Chinese. Victor Safonov, a graphic designer, made a huge contribution to the project. It was a pleasant and well-coordinated work. Of course, it was also important to improve navigation inside the museum to make everything clear and logical. The color played the main role in our project. I wanted to make it very noble and rich, because this is the Museum of Fine Arts, and paintings will be presented on these walls. We have highlighted the main thing with this color: the historical block, the area with the museum's collections and, of course, the main staircase. This color set off the balustrades of the stairs, making it the main dominant of the interior, making a visual impression on the visitor. In the entrance area, we also used the updated logo of the museum as the basis for the navigation design and for the elements of the wardrobe. A special place is occupied by showcases for museum souvenirs. We also created special modules in the shape of the museum logo with lighting so that visitors could feel comfortable. It was nice to meet a large team of professionals - museum workers. We immediately understood each other, practically from the first time the concept was formed and was approved, the main thing was to have time to implement it. Of course, the implementation process has not been completed yet and I would like to tell you about every detail, but it will be even more interesting to observe this process".
We are sure that if we tell about our talanted and hardworking partners and good contractors more often, so the country will know its heroes, and the world will become more beautiful and better! We wish Yana Permyakova and her team success and prosperity, and we believe that our new entrance area will give a start to our future cooperation!