Hi Riva. What you have asked for depends upon many, many factors. The cost per square foot is the most common but depends upon the complexity of the exhibits. The fees are usually percentage based, proportional to the budget and also depend upon the complexity of what you are looking for. Average budgets for fees for average exhibit design projects run at about 25% of the exhibit construction cost. More high tech exhibits can drive the fee cost up again depending upon the complexity of the exhibit. Fabricators have better insight to the cost of the exhibit then the designers does at the start. The fabricators developing their cost on a firm set of drawings and specifications. Designers have a hard time in pinning down exhibit fees, because at the onset of a project, all we have to go on is usually an idea of the exhibit based on a RFP. So getting and hourly cost is really hard without complete details of exactly what you want and applying a hourly cost times an estimated number of hours to design it. This is why most use the percentage of cost numbers. The amount of programming that you have completed directly effect the fees. The design fees increase with complexity simply because the more complex an exhibit is the more design and prototyping is required. If high tech is used then we hire computer geru to develop what we need and that can be expensive if the requirement is not close to a standard off the shelf program. Not an easy thing to explain. For Children’s Museum’s I have developed a guide of cost per square foot verses complexity. It can be used for science-related museums and similar interactive museums. Museum-l Does not like attachments so let me know by email and I’ll send you an electronic copy for your use. It brakes exhibit cost down to square foot prices based on complexity. This is for exhibits cost not for building cost. Children’s Museum’s usually do not have the greatest budgets so we have to use some of the Construction cost to supplement the exhibits. By this I mean that if we designed the exhibits a furniture then one could expect the exhibit cost to cost double. We design allot of the exhibit pieces to be built by the General contractors with the intricate pieces built by the fabricator and installed after the walls are up. Saves “mucho” bucks depending upon the exhibits. Some of these combinations Contractor Vs Fabricator can be seen on my web page. William M. Greaves AIA, NCARB Principal Architects iN Design http://www.architectsindesign.com [log in to unmask] 1(757) 478-6489 PHONE 1(757) 496-6489 FAX/PHONE Hi, I run the exhibits program at the Newberry Library in Chicago. I've been asked to do some research about the cost of exhibit design. I would appreciate hearing from people about how they budget for exhibit design. Per square foot? If so, how is the dollar amount per square foot established? As a percentage of the production budget? If so, what percentage of the production budget? Flat rate bid? Hourly rates? Etc. Please feel free to reply to me directly at [log in to unmask] Thanks in advance. Riva Feshbach -- Riva Feshbach Exhibits Manager The Newberry Library 60 West Walton Street Chicago, IL 60610 312-255-3536 [log in to unmask] ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).