Case Study · Events & Experiential · 2017
Retail as Research.
The Exhibition That Rewrote the Playbook.
The Portland Art Museum's "Animating Life" LAIKA exhibition became the museum's most successful install in a decade. The retail component was the proof-of-concept moment for the entire consumer products programme — and a masterclass in turning a captive audience into a data source.
#1
Most successful PAM install in a decade
2
Audience types mapped and served simultaneously
100%
Products curated from exhibition content
Live
R&D data fed directly into licensing programme
The Brief
The role extended well beyond the gift shop. Working alongside the exhibition design team and Dan Pascall, I was involved in three interconnected areas: helping design and build the exhibition itself, creating and installing the AV content throughout the exhibit, and designing and stocking the retail space at the end of the tour.
The AV work was integral to the exhibition's impact — the moving image content, the behind-the-scenes sequences, the production footage that gave context to the physical objects on display. Visitors weren't just looking at puppets and props. They were understanding how those objects came to exist, what went into making them, and why the level of care was as extraordinary as it was. That understanding was what the retail space then needed to honour.
The retail challenge was twofold: LAIKA fans who had specifically come to see the exhibition, and general museum visitors who had no prior relationship with the studio or the films. Both audiences had just walked through rooms containing the actual physical sets, puppets, and props. The retail space needed to be a continuation of that experience — not a gift shop appended to it.
Image — The Exhibition
Portland Art Museum, Animating Life: The Art, Science, and Wonder of LAIKA. The museum's most successful exhibition install in a decade.
01
Exhibition-Led Curation
Every product in the gift shop was selected or developed in direct relationship to something in the exhibition itself. The curatorial principle was simple: if it doesn't connect directly to something the visitor just experienced, it doesn't belong in the space.
The product mix was built from three data sources layered together:
SDCC sales data — established which product categories carried genuine emotional resonance for LAIKA fans specifically.
Museum gift shop best-seller data — identified what general museum visitors reliably purchased, regardless of exhibition subject.
Exhibition content itself — determined which moments in the tour created the strongest emotional response, directing where to focus the most distinctive product development.
The Broader Audience
02
The PAM audience was not exclusively LAIKA fans. A significant portion were general museum-goers — people who loved animation, art, craft, or simply the museum itself. Products oriented toward making and building — process kits, materials, instruction-led items — tested particularly well with this broader audience. The exhibition had shown them what extraordinary craft looked like. They wanted to try something themselves.
Image — testing the market
What This demonstrates
Retail design and curation at the intersection of brand, exhibition, and commercial objectives
Multi-audience strategy — designing simultaneously for existing fans and new audiences
Data synthesis across multiple sources to make product decisions
Managing the interface between a production studio's creative standards and an institution's commercial requirements
Using events as structured market research rather than one-off activations