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Wild Worlds 2011
Evaluation
Contents
Summary 3
Process 3
Design brief 3
Research challenges 4
Creative inputs 4
Contents 5
The space 5
MDF Structures 5
MDF Floor structures 6
Roof structures 6
Projection 6
Sound 7
Lighting 7
Cloth 8
Welcome Panel 9
'Stuff' and baskets 9
Sandbags 10
Pulleys 10
Seating 10
Facilitators 10
Volunteers 11
Hazards: 12
Marketing: 12
Integration with drop-in activities 12
Integration with Walking With Beasts 12
Training day 13
Statistics 13
Visitors quotes 15
Budget: 16
Introduction
The Herbert Art Gallery & Museum in Coventry has inclusion at the heart of its mission. Since 2003 there has
been a commitment to holding a Summer exhibition aimed at families and a programme of structured workshops
through most school holidays. In Summer 2011 the exhibition and workshops were jointly promoted as "Wild
Worlds".
The annual commitment to these activities and the continuity of staff have lead to the evolution of the design and
content, based on observation and evaluation over 8 years.
This evaluation focuses on the installation, although there have been growing synergies between the two strands.
This is combination of open-ended creative play opportunities and carefully panned structured workshops finds
strengths in what are often regarded as opposing approaches to early years activities.
Summary
Planning Team: Jack Shuttleworth (lead officer), Rosie Addenbrooke, Dominic Bubb, Mel Corner, Jamie Perry
Budget: £7450
Visitors: 7503
23 July – 11 September 2011
Process
The planning process stemmed from an evaluation of the 2010 installation "In the Big Treetop", and has a
traceable influence from the 2007 exhibition "Big Moves". The development began 8 months in advance with a
meeting between the two designers and project officer.
Design brief
Through experience, the Herbert has evolved a model which is
very successful. Some of the aspects of this are:
Use of the Herbert's "Studio" space which has an
excellent dance floor and theatre light and sound
installed
Structures created in house from MDF using the
Herbert's technical team
Materials which can be used in many sorts of play, such
as lengths of cloth, wooden pebbles etc.
No strongly representational structures or objects are
present in the space
Seating planned to discourage adults from taking a
spectator role
Creating a designed space that balances the freedom
for creative play (and hence mess) with the
expectations of a designed space with consistent
aesthetics in the gallery
The brief focused on further development of what were seen as
the strengths from 2010:
Build upon 'floor blobs'
Continue the exploration of creative lighting
Continue to develop 'backwaters' as safe spaces for babies
Continue the use of cloth as a way visitors can transform the structures and colours of the space
An early decision was to create a space that was not representational of the physical world in any way.
As in previous years the design contract was based on the TMA MRSL2 schedule for a studio design.
Research challenges
a) Removing 'making' activities
A significant change from the established model was to abandon the sticking, gluing and making activities. These
were always popular, but maintaining them and dealing with the mess they created consumed perhaps 80% of
the facilitator's time and prevented them from engaging with visitors pro-actively. This was a trade-off
particularly in favour of younger children, offering them more, cleaner space, at the expense of activities which
typically engaged older children (5+).
The Herbert's family friendly work has been guided by the reality that families often have children of mixed ages,
and activities with narrowly defined age restrictions are often excluding (a workshop for 8-12 year olds is often
not accessible to children who also has a 6 year old sibling). The Wild Worlds installation was in effect narrowing
its focus to offer a higher quality experience to groups where all the children were below around 5 years old.
The structured activities running in parallel tend to appeal to older children, but the impact on the whole Herbert
'offer' needs to be examined.
b) Inclusion, quests and worlds
A continuing challenge is a percentage of visitors who match the target audience but do not stay in the gallery
after an initial look inside. It has been felt that the main barrier for these people is the lack of rules, which is
central to the creative play dynamic, but also offers no guidance about how to interact with the space.
The approach for 2011 was to offer suggestions for ways of playing in the space, in such a way that they wouldn't
restrict children and adults who valued the freedom. This drew strongly on the emerging cultural field of
"pervasive gaming" and the work on positive game design typified by the work of Jane McGonigal and others.
The aim was to have 3 or 4 suggestions for games or quests. One of these would encourage visitors to move
beyond the exhibition into the wider Herbert (only one because of the logistical problems of a family where some
children wanted to move out of the space and others stay within).
Because it was felt that the quests would grow 'stale', a new set of suggestions would be offered for each of the 7
weeks of the exhibition. These would be driven by a new theme, or 'world'. This became the dominant planning
framework for the exhibition. The worlds were: Ice world; Cloud world; Underwater World; Forest World; Space
World; Underground World and "Dream World" (a 'best-of' of previous worlds).
Creative inputs
The process began with a Herbert planning team which is a standard format for all exhibitions, including
representatives from Learning, Marketing and Exhibitions & Events team. This agreed the outline principles and
the decision to re-employ the designers from 2010.
Designers Janet Vaughan and Nicola Richardson have grasped the subtleties and constraints of the exhibitions
over recent years. They have become part of the evaluation dialogue which underpins the year on year
developments in these summer installation. This was further advanced by a gestural response to the Pavilion of
Postcontemporary Curation's call for ideas for its proposed home at Sutton Scarsdale Hall, which developed ideas
for an ideal creative space without budgetary constraints.
In addition other artists were included in the process:
Nikki Pugh for games development
Arnim Friess for the dynamic lighting design
Emma O'Brien commissioned for textile interactives
Contents
The space
The Herbert's studio has been proven to be an ideal space for child-friendly activities. It has a semi-sprung dance
floor which is ideal for crawling and softens the impact of trips and falls. It also has a theatre style lighting rig and
sound system, enabling an immersive environment to be created easily.
MDF Structures
The defining forms inside the gallery are structures made from MDF. These comprised a central structure with a
'signpost/giraffe-head' and a set of ribs to create tunnels or dens; a corner section and two semi enclosed
structures flanking the gallery entrance.
These have all evolved from past experience. The rib tunnel form was continued from 2010, when it was
discovered that an open structure is far more enticing to younger children than a solid tunnel (2009 proved that
tunnels in general are very popular). Small children were sometimes afraid of the enclosed structure, but if the
walls are simply translucent cloth, then can enjoy the journeying whilst staying in closed visual contact with their
parents.
The Signpost was conceived as a focal point, and the
place where quests would be placed. Evaluation of
2010 showed that the large central tree structure was
often left inhabited, yet acted as a focus for families
defining spaces near to it, so its meaning was somehow
symbolic within the space.
The corner area was primarily meant to house sound
sensitive lamps which have been consistently popular
since 2007. In 2010 there was considerable
competition for access to the lamps from both babies
and older children, so the area was divided into 2 to
enable more visitors to enjoy them independently.
The two areas flanking the entrance are based on the understanding that if there are 6 year olds playing running
games, babies tend to be kept safe in their prams. By creating dead-ends, there are spaces where it is safe to
have far calmer activities, and this has proved to be a successful strategy in previous years. In use the “baby
backwater” role was more often played by the upholstered sections. We felt that these two built pieces could
have been improved by ensuring the bean bags could not be removed to other areas and possibly having arched
connections to the wall to encourage their personalisation with cloth pieces.
Lessons (throughout, these will include lessons learned in previous years as well as new discoveries):
The ribbed tunnel model remains the most accessible and flexible approach we’ve devised
It is vital to plan routes for running games, and build dead-end backwaters which are for babies
Cushions and bean-bags intended for specific spaces need to be fixed, otherwise they become part of the
moveable bulk of den-making objects
MDF Floor structures
In 2010 there were 5 small "floor blobs", roundish MDF pieces stacked to resemble mole-hills. These were
outstandingly popular with all ages of visitors, with older children jumping like stepping stones, adults using them
as a locus for a 'nest' and toddlers loving the predictable unevenness of them. From the evaluation, this was felt
to be a core aspect of the 2011 design.
The base needed for the cave and signpost was extended outwards, including 3 'pools' and bridges from one area
to the next. A series of free standing blobs linked the pools and created routes from traversing most of the space
without touching the floor.
Two of the pools were quite a distance from the signpost/cave unit and were filled with closed-cell foam, one
finished in a richly texture bath-mat material, the other in lycra and used as a projection screen.
Lessons:
The ‘floor blob’ is a powerful element, which conveys the duel contradictory aesthetic of things which are totally
new to visitors, yet which are immediately understood, and can be re-imagined in many ways.
The ‘pools’ formed focal points, particularly for gentle play with younger children and babies.
Roof structures
Nicola Richardson's experience in carnival design lead to large abstract shapes suspected from the ceiling. These
were hung so that they could be altered week to week, and were used to support lengths of fabric which were an
essential element of the colour scheme as it changed from week to week.
They also served to lower the height of the space and make its proportion hint at a space made for children.
Their uncomplicated yet unfamiliar forms were accessible both intellectually and physically, being within reach,
and often had user-created hangings suspended from them or were incorporated into cloth spatial structures.
There was considerable ambiguity as to which lengths of fabric were dressed (usually knotted out of reach of the
floor) and where visitors were welcome to make their own changes to the space. There were a few occasions
when visitors and/or facilitators clearly invested considerable effort in transforming the spaces, and this would
usually be honoured by being retained until the next change of 'world'.
Lessons:
The suspended structures operated powerfully to support the values of the space.
Having ‘roof’ elements within reach enabled visitors to transform the space beyond purpose built den areas.
They formed key positions for the weekly transformation between worlds and colour schemes, where the higher
(out of reach) parts were dressed and reinforced the lighting design most powerfully.
Projection
Previous experience has shown that video can be a strong lure for younger children entering the space for the
first time, where the movement catches their eye. A projection was focused vertically onto a soft area of the
floor structures using a mirror. The image changed to match the weekly theme, and the most popular was a loop
of jellyfish which was more figurative than the others. The videos were prepared by the lighting designer, who
said that the acrylic mirror (chosen for safety reasons) distorted the images and lost some if their impact. In
future years, a more robust mounting is needed to support a glass mirror safely.
Lessons:
Projection is a strong lure for very young children who are drawn to the movement.
Videos formed a focus for families to play with babies on the upholstered screen, and at other times interpreting
the video was a stronger driver of dramatic play.
Sound
The Herbert's sound engineer Daz Woods prepared a sound track for each of the worlds. Originally these were
played quietly enough to 'warm' the space when almost empty, but be easily drowned out by play at busier times.
A number of the sound tracks really stimulated the play and over the run of the exhibition it was found useful to
have the sound tracks louder, to offer a stronger stimulus.
Lessons:
Evocative sounds reinforce the sense of strangeness and encourage children to play dramatically.
Sound tracks should be as long as possible to avoid the stresses of repetition on staff and frequent visitors.
Lighting
Core lighting design
Arnim Friess was previously contracted to design the lights following his inputs into "In the Big Tree Top" and
"Spotlight: Belsen Head". He made two visits where he prepared lighting
stated that we would change according to each world. He was severely
limited by the number of working lamps and the simplicity of the lighting
control desk, and it is a priority to install a system that can run slow chase
sequences (originally part of the design for 2010's exhibition).
He also made use of hanging mirrors, two of which were aluminised sheet,
casting diffuse patterns on the walls, and the others A4 boards with mirrors
attached, suspected by threads so that they rotated in the draft of the fans,
throwing light across the room. There were numerous moments when
children would chase the moving points of light or suddenly understand their
source and point them out to adults. The simplicity, yet effectiveness of these
were a strong statement of the values of the whole exhibition, that wonderful
things could be made to happen with apparently simple objects.
LED sound activated lamps
We also used the sound triggered lamps which are a firm favourite with
children, changing colour in response to claps and other sounds. These were
not encased in previous years, so mounted above head height. This lead to a
more diffuse effect which perhaps lacked the impact of previous years, but
nevertheless created the most consistently popular area in the space. In
previous exhibitions we witnessed a competition to enjoy these lamps,
particularly between older children (5+) and babies. This year they lit an area
which was split into two with two lamps shining into each, to encourage
multiple users. This did work, although the area was also a key den-building
and hoarding location. We also noticed that more lamps tended to bring the
overall light towards white rather than deeper hues.
Other LED lamps
We installed two LED lanterns near the entrance in order to add stimulus to the first impression visitors saw.
Originally these were on very slow subtle cycles, which went unnoticed, and later used more rapid fades between
colours, tied to the colour scheme for each week.
We also installed a device which combined a pan/tilt system and a high power torch. In its first version, this
illuminated one spot, then moved in a random direction before vanishing. The torch used simply was not bright
enough to catch children's attention and this was replaced by a home made lamp based on a high power Cree
MC-E LED (under-powered to 1VA for safety reasons). The first version of this placed sots of light of random
colour in one of nine positions on the floor, hoping to trigger a 'guess where/what colour' game. This was more
popular, but the floor was usually compromised with other objects that its operation wasn't obvious. A final
version focussed on a static point on the floor, cycling through 9 colours at 2.5 hertz (above 3 flashes per second
could potentially trigger photosensitive epileptic seizures), then fading. This was a strong activity in the space,
especially if the point of the light was highlighted by a stool, mirror etc.
Lessons:
The use of designed lighting conveys the special properties of the entire exhibition, distinguishing it from other
spaces such as “Whacky Warehouses” or other galleries in the Herbert.
The lighting acted as another exemplar of the philosophy of the space, being both easily understood and
intellectually transparent, yet conveying a high level of skill in the execution.
On only one occasion did visitors feel intimidated by the relative darkness, and in previous years this has
happened simply due to the strangeness of the space.
The designer has made a strong plea for a computerised system (Chamsys) for 2012 allowing complex fades etc.
Cloth
Cloth is perhaps the primary interactive element of the installation. Following the example of "In the Big Tree
Top" the majority of cloth was limited to a colour palette that matched the lighting, but changing week to week
according to the theme.
Coventry is blessed with an excellent drapers adapted to the needs of the South Asian community which sells light
cottons and gauzes in a very wide range of colours. This enabled us to have cloth lengths which we can match to
each week's colour palette, but with a consistent weight and weave.
Much of the cloth is used for 'set dressing' and creating the colour scheme of the installation, including out of
reach in the overhead structures. But also much was available for den-building and other structural
transformations by the children and adults in the space. Clothes pegs added possibilities and frequently complex
dens connected the built structures to the walls and hanging pieces.
This cloth was equally free to be used for dressing-up. We had feared that long lengths (2, 3 or 5 meters) might
be hazardous, but this was not our experience. We also had some extra pieces which we had chosen for dressing-
up potential, particularly lycra, fur fabric and chenille. In practice all cloth existed in a multi-use pool, and at some
times virtually all was used in dens, or for carefully crafted costume play.
Lessons:
Cloth is both familiar and accessible, and perhaps the strongest example of elements which the visitors can use in
many different ways.
Cloth enables visitors to impact upon the larger scale structures and colour choices of the installation.
Cloth is equally an accessible dressing up, den building and dramatic material.
Welcome Panel
To convey some of the quests for each world, we simply had an A3 laminated sheet hung from a rope around the
central sign post structure.
Welcome to Wild Worlds
Wild Worlds only makes sense when you use your imagination
Feel free to move things around, build dens, hoard treasure and invent your own games.
This week's theme is …. (whichever, and three quests or games that match the theme)
Our facilitators are here to help you play
In practice we didn't observe many people playing the games suggested, but the sign was nevertheless very
useful. Often parents would see it from the entrance and walk up to read it, already overcoming the question
whether or not to enter the unfamiliar space. They would sometimes read it aloud or simply re-interpret its
message to their children. Because of the weekly change-over, the signs where relatively crude, but their
usefulness suggests that greater attention should be given to them in the future
Lessons:
Ensure future designs include signage to lure visitors inside the installation and convey the openness of the offer.
'Stuff' and baskets
We had a number of small objects suitable for sorting,
collecting and arranging. These included some 1"
diameter bottle tops, plastic coat-hanger hooks, bendy
plastic sticks and wooden pebbles, pine cones and
hardboard numbers. Except for the pebbles these
have all been obtained from Derby scrap store (PARC.
These were sorted by type, arranged in careful
patterns or mixed together as part of a meal, with each
being a particular food type when served.
These small items were mostly used in conjunction
with a range of baskets, ranging from shallow dishes to
larger bins and handled baskets. Many children
evolved activities that simply involved collecting and
carrying baskets of things from one place to another.
At one extreme this became 'hoarding' when they
would seek to possess everything in the space, which left other children with nothing to use. Usually a polite chat
would persuade them to release some materials for others to enjoy. We had included two large plastic bins at
the beginning of the exhibition, but found they were able hold virtually all of the small objects and hence deny
materials to others visitors, and withdrew them.
Lessons:
Alongside cloth, things for sorting, collecting and reinterpreting were the key activities offered in the space.
Objects work best when there are large numbers of similar item, which can be arranged or collected.
Objects which were similar but had differences (eg colour) invited interpretation of their distinguishing features.
Sandbags
After reading about how people are happiest while working hard, we commissioned a set of sandbags, some very
heavy, but others filled with lighter and often textured fillings. They were made in a range of colours and
proportions, so that it was impossible to judge their weight by eye. For smaller children some of these were right
at their limits of their strength, and many took real pleasure in using them to construct walls or name them as
elements in imagined play. The majority of the heavier sand filled bags didn't survive the full of the exhibition and
began leaking.
Lessons:
Sandbags or other heavy objects offer a quality of experience rarely available to younger children indoors
In future weighted objects must be robust, possibly using some alternative weighting (clay?)
Pulleys
We installed a number of rope pulleys tied-off to cleats in the wall and hanging via ropes hanging from the ceiling.
These were all fairly close to the gallery walls for logistical reasons, and were fitted with cloths pegs. They
enabled cloth 'tents' to extend far beyond the built and suspended structures, or so simply add form and décor to
the walls.
The pulleys suffered considerably, presumably because of the simple pleasures of pulling hard on ropes. In future
years it may be worth using heavier hardware (cleats and 'o' rings). The ropes themselves were hemp, which
have an aesthetic resonant of ships ropes, but doesn't burn if pulled over skin and was very cheap from online
army surplus suppliers.
Lessons:
Suspended ropes enable visitors to extend the roof and MDF structures, using cloth to make enclosed spaces or
hanging colour-scapes.
Safety demands cleats to tie off loose ends and also limits the lighting design by constraining where lamps can
point.
The eagerness of children to use all the strength and weight means that rope systems must be strongly built.
Seating
One of the earliest lessons from the Herbert's early years installations is that seating has a huge bearing on
whether adults take the role of audience or active participants.
Lessons:
Normal high seating at the edge of the gallery will encourage adults to act as spectators.
Low seats that can be incorporated into the play and structures encourage (but do not force) participation, and
hence are preferred.
High seats are always available for people who need, but facilitators need to be alert to offer them.
Facilitators
Paid facilitators have been a critical element of family friendly activities at the Herbert since 2003. Recruitment is
primarily targeted at graduating students on arts and education courses at nearby universities, and the pay rates
reflect its intention to be a professional development opportunity. Their role covered both the structured drop-in
sessions and the creative play installation, and although recruitment was exceptionally competitive, all of them
had stronger experience of one approach over the other and the beginning of the summer.
There is a dilemma each year as to whether we use the previous years' facilitators (who have great experience
and hence offer best value to the public) or recruit a new batch (giving opportunities to new entrants to the field,
and taking considerable effort in the recruitment process). In 2011 we recruited 4 facilitators, the number being a
balance between meeting our needs and having flexibility to manage crises, whilst maximising the available paid
hours for each facilitator. We also used two previous facilitators as mentors.
In the installation, the facilitator's role is to encourage creative play and overcome any barriers to participation,
most frequently the fearfulness inspired by such an unfamiliar place. They added a benign presence that
combined a welcome and sense of informality, a subtly conveyed permission interact in the space, either through
example, moving and re-arranging things, or by direct conversation, and often encouragement to play via one to
one interactions.
Lessons:
Facilitators have an established role, particularly important in mediating the strangeness of the installation to new
visitors and encouraging higher levels of creative play.
The decision to remove the sticking and gluing activities did, as predicted, enable the facilitators to concentrate
on their core role .
Volunteers
We had two volunteers whose role was specifically data gathering on exit, although as they grew familiar with the
space, they added to the gentle welcome that offers permission to visitors. It had been intended that volunteers
would be trained to understand the ethos of the exhibition and its context in the debates over creative play, and
in evaluation with very young children, but due to timing confusions this didn't happen.
We realise that it is often a difficult process to get several children to leave the gallery, and a traditional
intervention with a clipboard just as they left would not be welcome, so we tried to talk to them as they were in
the process of packing with the invitation to do one last thing for us. This was to place their fingerprint on the
wall outside the gallery, and was a task that children and adults both relished. We used washable ink stamps,
with a different colour for each week, and this created a large symbol of the community of users of the space.
This was a successful approach but became a major task when making-good after the exhibition and needs
revising.
While they were doing this, our volunteers asked a few brief questions, recording how many were in the group of
different ages, asking how long they had stayed, is this their first, second etc visit and to suggest any words that
might describe their visit. This data is more detailed than in previous years and will enable us to demonstrate the
value of the exhibition to its visitors.
Both volunteers, Siân and Ayman proved excellent and described the experience very positively. The quality of
the data-set (see 'Statistics' below) was actually poor and the chief benefit was to the volunteers, who gained a
rare insight into a highly specialised methodology, and to highlight issues with our training and monitoring of
volunteers.
Lessons:
Ensure training is available for volunteers.
Ensure volunteers are recruited to cover the period of the installation.
Improve monitoring of the data recorded.
Attempt to produce a data set to model the association between head count on entry and the data collected at
exit.
Hazards:
The very nature of Wild Worlds seems fraught with dangers – slip and trip hazards, bumping heads when tunnels
are obscured by cloth, etc. In practice most of these events happened occasionally, but never severely and the
response from parents was always to overlook it and continue playing. The key safety message was for parents to
be responsible at all times.
In terms of fire evacuation, we developed an approach assuming 10 laden buggies in bad weather, which couldn't
evacuate because of the lifts being barred from usage. It would be likely that parents wouldn't be willing to leave
their prams and their contents needed to look after the children for an unknown length of time. Our response
was to have a stock of large shoulder bags which was would asked parents to place critical materials.
Marketing:
Wild Worlds was marketed as an integrated offer of
workshops and installation. This was fairly complex
because the workshops had very specific opening
hours and the installation was open throughout. In
previous years the two elements had been marketed
separately, which lead to other confusions.
Marketing was via the Herbert Family Friendly leaflet
and its existing distribution systems. A graphic was
commissioned from Blind Mice, which was initially
felt to appeal to children, but not to parents of
babies, who are a key audience. Solutions were
proposed, but within 24 hours of the print deadline
no amendments had been made. A token attempt
was implemented at the last minute, but it was felt
that this had failed to meet the brief.
Lessons:
Be more assertive regarding artwork that doesn't
meet the brief. Consider penalty clauses.
Integration with drop-in activities
A major development for 2011 was an attempt to
connect the highly popular drop-in workshops with
the changing world themes of the installation. There
has always been a close connection, with many
visitors first queuing for the drop-in sessions, then spending time in the installation. This year the workshops built
on the theme, and most successfully had families making craft objects that could be directly used in the quests
within the installation and wider museum. The highlights of these were cloud making, the clouds were made,
then blown around the museum to find something that needed rain (or electricity if it was a thunder cloud); jet
packs for space world, again used to traverse the whole museum, and making fish to play in underwater world.
Integration with Walking With Beasts
Two of the worlds were chosen specifically to support the charged exhibition "Walking with Beasts" – Ice and
Forest. There were many moments when play clearly built on the link, but equally, the intention that children
wouldn't be bound by the given themes, meant that we witnessed mammoths and monster games in 'space
world' and 'underground world'.
There was a significant response from visitors who had been to Walking with Beasts that they had spent much
longer in Wild Worlds. Although this encoded a criticism of Walking with Beasts (the Herbert's first charged-for
exhibition which was also much older than the permanent displays), their experience of Wild Worlds ameliorated
their response to the Herbert's offer as a whole.
Training day
We held a professional development day focusing on designing aesthetic spaces for early years. This topic was
selected to avoid competition with a day in the same week specifically on family learning in museums, run by the
MLA, at which the Herbert project officers also gave inputs.
The day attracted 16 specialists from the East and West Midlands, ranging from students to professional artists
and workers in early years settings.
A key outcome of this was a sense that workers in nurseries needed to persuade their managers of the benefits of
creative play.
Statistics
Statistics were gathered through two methods: a manual 'clicker' count on entry and exit interviews by
volunteers.
The "clicker " data set is 83% complete. The gaps have been extrapolated using 7 day moving averages.
The volunteer interviews had a significant number of gaps and large quantities were incomplete either to be
unusable, or need reconstruction via extrapolation. On the days when data was collected volunteers interviewed
36% of the recorded visitors, which amounts to 16% of the overall visitors. This is a low figure (the 16% includes
upwards of 40% incomplete (extrapolated) collection, so under 7% of the visitors were reliably recorded), but it is
also skewed in that it misses entire weeks at the beginning and end of the installation when the clicker results
showed the most variation from the norm.
Key metrics:
Total attendance: 7,503
Under 5s: 5-16 years: 16+ years:
2,503 2,122 2,787
33% 28% 38%
Average family size: 3.9 people
Average stay in Wild Worlds: 36 minutes (maximum 220, minimum 1)
The daily visitor figures (from reliable 'clicker' data) show a weekly cycle with low weekend figures, but a
considerable amount of variability from day to day, at least in part associated with poor weather (highest
numbers on rainy days).
Daily figures average 160 with a downward trend towards the end, beginning after August Bank Holiday and
dropping to 49 per day once schools went back on September 5th.
daily visitor count
450
400
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
l
p
g
g
g
g
g
Ju
Au
Au
Au
Au
Au
Se
25
05
01
08
15
22
29
Duration of stay. The exit interviews asked visitors how long they had spent in the Wild Worlds installation. The
results show a median around 30 minutes and 20% staying an hour or more.
It is likely that these figures under report the visits with the shortest duration, because it was harder to intercept
visitors who effectively looked around and walked out. Approximately 5% of visitors did not stay beyond 5
minutes, which matches data collected in 2010. The answers are clearly influenced by a tendency to round
figures when interviewed hence a spike at 60 minutes, but we also observed some attenders using time limits
such as one hour to encourage children to move on.
Duration of visit in Wild Worlds
25% 25% 50% 75%
20%
% of familes
15%
10%
5%
0%
5 15 25 35 45 55 65 75 85 95 105 115
minutes
Visitors quotes
A mix of adults and children's quotes collected by the volunteers:
Loved the new theme – so colourful!
The colours on the wall were rocket-launcher buttons.
Kids liked the correspondence between the crafts downstairs and Wild Worlds upstairs.
My grandson is an only child – Wild Worlds allows him to meet other children and mix – invaluable!
A really amazing room
Little babies liked sitting on the pond with the colours – really fascinated
The fabric quality is really amazing – 9 year old said he was bored after 10 mins, but overall the younger ones
enjoyed themselves. (This group stayed 25 minutes)
The music was so adventurous, gives an underground feeling to the space, so spectacular!
The den making was just amazing and allowed our 9 year son to let his imagination take over.
The lighting makes you feel like you're in a theatre.
Wild Worlds is just outstanding, very relaxing (she just wants to sleep in the soft area), safe and such beautiful,
calm scenery.
As an adult, all you see is a bunch of cloth and ropes, but as a child its the most wonderful place to use your
imagination . . this is something really special.
Our 2, 6 and 8 year olds had a ball letting their imaginations run wild in here today. It was lovely to see a creative
play activities that did not involve sitting at a table and making something. They were very sad to leave
their den at the end of the day.
Absolutely brilliant, very happy in this room.
2 kids (9 & 10) got a bit bored, surrounded by small children, felt it was too young for them.
The Wild Worlds shows absolute unique creativity displayed for the kids imagination – so creative!
Brilliant, really love it! The beautiful concept of combining fabric and sounds is just amazing.
Definitely one of the best galleries in the midlands.
This year Wild Worlds is much better for imagination.
Baby and toddler really enjoyed the lights that change colour. Older kids wanted to leave after 10 minutes,
younger ones would have stayed longer.
Really fun being an alien! Favourite was hiding treasure.
Lovely – would have stayed the whole day. Pirates! Awesome! Marvellous
We come here every week for the new theme. Making fish lunch our of wooden blocks was fun
I liked going up and down the steps I liked the spirals in the ceiling
Jellyfish were beautiful. More pink things
Love the movement with lighting and wind blowing Really liked making a barbeque
the materials I played a sheriff and I liked being in charge of the
I liked jumping on the pod with the jellyfish. cowboys in the jungle
Fandabidocious Lovely, beautiful, definitely coming back next week
I liked going through the tunnels. The facilitator engaged fantastically with the kids
Bit too young for me. So lovely and relaxing
Fave bit was the den – it was rocking! Fun, Fantastic!
I liked playing fished with my friends.
Birdy Brown Colour-y
Busy Dark Spooky
Snakey Weird Funny
Pretty Soft Fantastic
Fun furry Creepy forest
Budget:
The planned budget was as follows:
Income
E&E budget 7450
Expenditure
Build Design fee 1500
Build materials 745
LX design &
materials 568
Consult 229
Roof pieces 305
Dressing 473
Vinyl & signage 210
Skip 133 4,163
Fit-out play materials 123
commission 300
top-up & repair 423
Running Facilitators 2511
Cleaning 2,511
Contingency 5% 351 351
Sum 7448 7,448
