Tender for Design Services for New Gallery at the National Army Museum

The NAM wishes to appoint a design company, to create the design for the Army at Home Gallery from the concept stage to final dimensioned As Built drawings to construct from. The successful tenderer will be responsible for not only the look and feel of the exhibition, but also any 3D structural elements and exhibition furniture, interactives and operational elements. The designer will also be responsible for 2D graphi identity from concept to installation. The NAM has display cases which we would like to re-utilise to keep costs down, which need to be resited in new walls. The design should have a logical visitor flow that allows for visitors to understand the chronology within the themes. All structural elements and exhibition furniture must be compliant with CDM regulations and H&S guidelines. Materials utilised need to have passed Oddy testing and be suitable for use with historic artefacts and agreed with NAM in advance. Design solutions for the display of objects must be approved by the Head of Exhibitions at the NAM. The look and feel of the exhibition must enhance the aims and themes of the exhibition narrative.

The successful tenderer is also responsible for the graphic elements of the exhibition, including title walls, text panels, object labels and large-scale imagery. The successful tenderer should account for the production of visuals for presentation to NAM board members and also artworking graphic files to print from. The successful designer will be required to liaise with graphic production companies to produce the graphics elements, including approval of proofs. This is a complete design turnkey operation.

The designer will therefore be required to attend regular project meetings, some of which will be on site. It is crucial that site visits take place on a regular basis to ensure that structures fit the space and the layout utilises existing socket and data outlets, whilst accommodating other fire requirements and security cameras within the space.

The visual identity of the graphic elements of the exhibition, should also take the NAM permanent galleries style guidelines into account, ensuring that all galleries have their own identity, yet work together as a cohesive whole. Graphic identity also needs to be translatable to marketing and public programming. Therefore, the successful designer should be willing to make these elements available to other NAM departments.