Roto, a museum design/build firm, looked to Lightswitch to be their lighting design partner and collaborator on the Korean and Vietnam War exhibit at The National Museum of Military Vehicles, which boasts the world’s largest privately-owned military vehicle collection.
Roto, a museum design/build firm, is accustomed to designing large exhibits for science museums, and is especially adept at creating immersive experiences using a combination of projections, lighting, and creatively interactive installations. Roto looked to Lightswitch to be their lighting design partner and collaborator on the Korean and Vietnam War exhibit at The National Museum of Military Vehicles, which boasts the world’s largest privately-owned military vehicle collection. Together, our teams elevated this meticulously-restored collection of historic vehicles, using our collective expertise to bring to life the harrowing story of the soldiers who served in the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
Rather than taking the standard approach of lining the vehicles up and packing them in, Roto was allowed to develop immersive environments and use creative storytelling. This departure from a typical vehicle museum exhibit resulted in a spaciousness that gave Lightswitch and Roto the opportunity to add drama to the experience. By only placing a few tanks in a single room, the vehicles could be displayed in environments similar to those in which they would have existed in the Wars. This atmospheric immersion was achieved through lighting, projection mapping, and scenic elements such as a bamboo forest installation with an LED-lit path leading through it.
Throughout the process, Lightswitch took into consideration the care with which these vehicles had been restored, and always sought to portray them in their best light. We walked the line between theatricality and museum-quality lighting in order to tell the soldiers’ stories while still creating an educational exhibit for visitors. Perhaps most importantly, our team made sure that the experiences of the soldiers were portrayed accurately. From a tableau of one of the infamous caravans of the Vietnam war, to a depiction of a fire base, to the tale of the “Frozen Chosen” soldiers who struggled through chilled conditions, Roto and Lightswitch utilized their expertise in themed environments to ensure the honesty of the exhibits. Visitors to the museum were immersed in a theatrical experience that emulated what the soldiers went through. A fine line between realism and display lighting had to be maintained due to concerns for active and former military visitors and their needs.
Through a combination of theatrical and museum-quality lighting, Lightswitch was able to create a symbiosis of styles that served the story that the museum was seeking to tell. The exhibit, which began at the museum’s entrance as a traditional display of military vehicles and slowly transformed into an immersive storytelling experience as the audience went deeper into the space, challenged us to find a balance between thematic and authentic lighting. For example, our use of projected tank-track patterns on the floor successfully emulated the experience of walking through a war-torn jungle, while still maintaining the atmosphere of a museum exhibit. We used our varied expertise to honor the carefully restored pieces displayed in the museum, as well as to tell the true stories of soldiers from the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
