Flooding at the Saint Louis Zoo. Credit: u/stanzej
Lake at the Saint Louis Zoo. Credit: Saint Louis Zoo
When it rains, it floods… And when the skies stay clear for too long, drought takes over. Climate change is reshaping the world, and attractions are feeling the impact. With firsthand experience in climate-related disaster, the Saint Louis Zoo is using lessons learned in planning and designing for the future.
"Media is one of the most powerful storytelling tools," says PJ Tamayo, Media Designer and Illustrator at PGAV. Whether it’s a theme park, zoo, or digital interactive, PJ believes integrating media elements like video and audio can instantly immerse guests and reveal their purpose in the story.
A.D. Gladu, PGAV Creative Writer, always has a cast of characters in her head. Gladu understands guests bring myriad perspectives when they walk through the gate, and she considers this whether she’s developing the guest journey or a live play. Understanding the audience is the cornerstone of compelling storytelling in attraction design, and the primary step.
Graphic design leverages the brain’s ability to decode visual information almost instantaneously into sophisticated storytelling. Graphic designers, as key strategists, think critically about the audience, purpose, and context. In this week’s Destinology, Kathleen Robert, Senior Graphic Designer at PGAV, explains how graphics play a role in the deep connection between design and human psychology.
The role of an illustrator in the design world goes beyond creating pretty pictures. They play a crucial role in storytelling at an attraction, helping communicate the vision of the built environment. In this week’s Destinology, Jason Mills, Director of Visual Development, articulates the role of illustrators at PGAV as visual storytellers.
Storytelling has always existed. It’s how we share information, preserve history, and pass down family legacies. Storytelling allows us to share information while tugging at our emotions, capturing our attention, motivating, and inspiring us.
In this week’s Destinology, Carol Breeze, PGAV’s Lead Designer of Story Experience, discusses storytelling strategy and asks, “What now?”
History is not just an assemblage of dates, events, and names; it's the collective story of humanity, shaping our present and influencing our future. However, for centuries, history has often been told from a narrow perspective, omitting crucial voices and perspectives, leaving only fragments of the whole story. In this week’s Destinology, we explore how the Missouri History Museum brought a more comprehensive story of the 1904 World’s Fair to life in a new exhibit with the help of Ria Unson, a local artist with a personal connection to the Fair.
