Dear Fellow Listers,
We have received funding for a new museum facility
that will hopefully break ground this fall. We have been brainstorming
concepts and themes for the new exhibit areas and want to calculate some cost
estimates.
I know that there are many factors
involved in the cost of designing and fabricating an exhibit (collections
issues, furniture fabrication, number and type of interactives, etc.) which
impact the cost to great and varying degrees. I know that
there has been discussion about this on the list before. I also know
however, that inflation and the economy being what it is, these costs may have
changed a great deal over the past couple of years.
So, given all of this - what are people using
these days as a cost range for a per-square-foot figure for estimating cost
of exhibit design, fabrication, and installation for a
collections-intensive-with-some-interactives exhibit. I have seen some
estimates as low as $100/sq.ft. and some as high as $500/sq.ft. I
need a figure I can use with potential donors so if they want to fund an entire
exhibit, I can have a ballpark figure that would cover everything from concept
development to grand opening by hiring an outside firm to do the fabrication and
installation; in other words, paying someone to do everything except the
curatorial work since we had to lay off our entire exhibit staff last year due
to budget cuts.
Thank you for any input you may have, especially if
it is based on recent experience.
Sincerely,
Elizabeth Moore
Dr. Elizabeth Moore
Assistant Director of
Science and Learning
Curator of Collections and Archaeology
Virginia
Museum of Natural History
1001 Douglas Avenue
Martinsvile, VA
24112
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(276)
666-8600