Principal of the New York media design firm, Local Projects, Jake Barton creates interactive and digital exhibits for the likes of the 9/11 Memorial Museum, Cleveland Museum of Art and Storycorps.
Why you should listen
Jake Barton is principal and founder of Local Projects, a New York-based design firm which specializes in media design. Since 2006, Barton and his team have been working on creating the media design for the 9/11 Memorial and Museum; they also worked to develop the algorithm used to place names around the 9/11 Memorial itself. Other clients include the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, the Frank Gehry-designed Eisenhower Presidential Memorial and Cleveland Museum of Art.
In 2013, Local Projects was named the National Design Award winner for Interaction Design, while in 2011 it was listed as the second most innovative design firm by Fast Company magazine. Meanwhile, The Atlantic writes of Barton, "At the crux of Barton's work is the idea of collaborative storytelling, which invites museum and memorial visitors to share their own experiences, observations, and memories through interactive technology, turning passive observers into active participants."
What others say
Over the past decade, Local Projects has collected over 100,000 individuals' stories and memories, and shared them with millions more through innovative visual and interactive technology like interactive projection walls and pop-up recording booths.
Jake Barton’s TED Talk
More news and ideas from Jake Barton
Arts + Design
Beautiful, old stuff is still really cool: A look inside the new Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
December 12, 2014
As the Cooper Hewitt opens its doors after a three-year renovation, we take a look at what the curators have put together -- including an exhibit put together by Maira Kalman and technology from Local Projects.
Continue readingGallery
11 moving images from 9/11 submitted by people around the world
September 11, 2013
In 2006, Jake Barton of the interactive media design firm Local Projects received a challenge unlike any other: to create the installations for the 9/11 Memorial Museum, which will open in 2014, with Thinc Design. September 11 is not a historical event made safe and sterile by the passage of decades and centuries. Today is just […]
Continue readingNews
Building the 9/11 Memorial Museum: Reflections as opening day approaches
September 10, 2013
In today’s moving TED Talk, Jake Barton of the design firm Local Projects shares the idea at the core of the yet-to-open National September 11 Memorial Museum: that museum-goers need to be included in the telling of the story. “The event is so recent, somewhere between history and current events,” says Barton, explaining that more […]
Continue reading