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National WWI Museum and Memorial Technology Refresh and Encounters — National WWI Museum and Memorial

A multiyear technology refresh of the National WWI Museum and Memorial in Kansas City, Missouri, unveiled May 2025, added Encounters — a new experience presenting 16 first-person wartime stories via sensor-activated, life-size projected characters — alongside upgrades across the museum's theaters and galleries; exhibit and media design by Ralph Appelbaum Associates and Dot Crew, AV design and integration by Electrosonic.

VenueNational WWI Museum and Memorial
Project typeMajor Renovation
StatusCompleted
Year completed2025
Technologiesinteractive media, spatial audio, sensor-activated projection, media server

Credits

FirmRoleNote
Ralph Appelbaum Associates Exhibit Design Exhibit and media design
dot-crew Media Design & Software Interactive media design for Encounters.
Electrosonic AV Integration AV design, engineering, and systems integration across theaters, galleries, and Encounters
Technical Artistry Lighting Design
av-stumpfl Media Design & Software Four PIXERA two media servers and one PIXERA Control Core distribute and synchronize media across the museum's galleries and the Encounters experience, integrated with the ISAAC AV workflow platform; AV Stumpfl (maker of PIXERA) is Austria-headquartered.

Description

Distinct from the museum's 2006 renovation and expansion (`national-wwi-museum-renovation`) and the separately-sourced 2024 RLMG interactive-media refresh (`national-wwi-museum-2024-media-refresh`) and 2025 Taylor Studios trench/triage gallery refresh (`national-wwi-museum-2025-trench-triage-refresh`) — these may overlap in scope with this broader technology refresh but are recorded separately since each is independently sourced from its own firm's portfolio and the full relationship between the projects is not stated in any single source. Encounters features four alcoves where visitors step into illuminated floor markers to trigger life-size, sensor-activated characters based on real wartime personalities; a Kemper Horizons Theater sequence and the Battlescapes edge-blended-projection experience were also part of the refresh.

Sources