The Wild Center

The Wild Center is alive. As the Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks, it is a base camp for exploring a 6-million-acre collection. Its living collection is the Adirondacks themselves.

Situated on a 31-acre campus in Tupper Lake, New York, the museum’s main exhibit follows a river to the summit of a snowcapped mountain and includes waterfalls, a lake exhibit, forests, and streams. Two hundred live animal species inhabit this living museum. The museum’s Great Hall is dominated by a towering ice wall, and its core contains a forest populated with high-definition interactive media.

Goals

Work collaboratively to define the museum’s vision, brand and voice.

Determine positioning and naming strategy.

Design the brand identity.

Write the mission, master plan and exhibit text.

The museum team included: Museum project manager and staff Board of Trustees HOK, a global architectural practice that specializes in innovation in the built environment, and designs museums, wayfinding, and exhibits Chedd-Angier-Lewis, museum media design and production ConsultEcon, economic research and management consultants Points North, communications and branding firm Our mission is to inspire a broad public understanding of the natural systems that shape and sustain life in the Adirondacks.

The Adirondacks are unique in the world. Surrounded by people, they house great expanses of nature interspersed with small towns and communities. They can be a model for a future where man and the rest of the natural world find better ways to coexist. Donald K. Clifford, Jr.

President The Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks

Process and strategy: Points North Communications worked closely with the project manager, museum staff, Board of Trustees, the architectural and exhibit design team, and the market research group. Points North interviewed board members, scientists, experts on the Adirondacks, and museum staff, and examined the successes and failures of similar institutions. In addition to looking at natural history subjects and Adirondacks-related material, the Points North team interviewed tourism leaders and read their research. The team traveled repeatedly to the Adirondacks to hike and boat to see what the museum would cover. The team also sat in on every meeting the architects had with the Board to shape the vision of the museum. Points North was engaged to write the master plan and the mission, and to direct the visual identity program and naming. The firm subsequently was hired to do all marketing and communications, and to write the text for all the museum’s exhibits. “The exhibit work gives us a chance to speak to the visitor inside the Center, and the marketing work gives us the chance to speak to them before they step inside,” said President Howard Fish. Creative solution: The dynamic symbol design embodies the fundamental essence of nature always changing. The museum logo, drawn by WoodPile Studios, is a fish changing into an otter, to suggest part of life’s endless process. In nature, when the otter dies, it will feed the river, which illustrates the connection between the land and the water.

The symbol captured the spirit of the museum and was subsequently used as a guide in the naming process. Originally named the Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks, the team felt that the words “museum” and “history” misrepresented the engaging experience. The New York State Constitution created the forest with a commitment to being “forever wild.” The team wanted a name that could be easily said and remembered by visitors from around the world. The Wild Center would be distinguished from other national and world museums and institutions.

Results: The crowd for the groundbreaking ceremony in 2004 was bigger than the crowds for the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Olympics groundbreaking. The museum has exceeded all fundraising targets. Initial surveys suggest that The Wild Center will become the most recognizable brand in the Adirondacks. It is the most successful nonprofit start-up in the history of the Adirondacks.

We were defining the brand while it was still evolving. We had to come up with a solution that would clearly define the museum but not constrict it in the future. Howard Fish

President Points North Communications

The symbol also mirrors an aerial view of the museum’s location on an oxbow on the Raquette River. The color of the symbol changes with the seasons.