Arnold Arboretum’s Bonsai & Penjing Collection
For the final project for our Spring 2022 Experience Design I class, we were tasked with finding an exhibit in Boston where there was some form of a visitor experience. From there we had to use the research methodologies and human-centered design approach we had learned over the course of the semester to determine how we could improve upon this experience. My project partner and I chose the Bonsai & Penjing collection at Harvard University’s Arnold Arboretum as our project focus with the aim of taking a holistic approach when redesigning the experience had within the collection. Through researching various Zen, Bonsai, and Penjing collections around the world, many visits to the collection, multiple interviews with the Head of Plant Production and the Bonsai Specialist at the arboretum, and organizing all of the data we collected into cohesive diagrams and presentations, we were able to create compelling, thoughtful, and innovative solutions to some of the problems they currently face, and overall enhance the visitor experience within the collection. We were fortunate enough to be able to present our findings back to the Arnold Arboretum and they have decided to use our suggestions going forward.
Check out the LinkedIn post on it!
The Space
Photos and a video that takes you through what the collection looks like.
Research
Photos of various Zen gardens and Bonsai collections from around the world.
Photos from our meeting and interview with the Head of Plant Production.
Diagram we created to show our first visit to the collection.
After more visits and researching visitors, we created this diagram to reflect the current visitor experience in the collection.
Interventions
After thoroughly researching, ideating, and using a human-centered design approach, these are the solutions we came up with. From this we created the Post-Experience Diagram to show how the visitor experience would be altered in the space.
Presentation
As mentioned above, we were fortunate enough to be able to sit down with the Head of Plant Production, the Bonsai Specialist, and the Greenhouse Horticulture Technologist at the Arboretum to present our findings and interventions. The presentation goes more in-depth on our findings from our research, our design framework, and the ideas surrounding our chosen interventions. If you are interested, you can click the button below to see a PDF copy of that presentation.