For the inaugural exhibition at the National Museum of Architecture in Oslo since its closure for refurbishment in 2023, Nissen Richards Studio was invited to design the exhibition for BOOM!, exploring the impact of the post-war baby boom on architecture. Between 1940 and 1970, the Norwegian baby boom changed the way that architects were designing homes, schools and public spaces. Suddenly, the child was the centre of attention and architecture became a tool with which adults could shape their lives.

With a target audience of 7- to-9-year-olds, this exhibition aimed to bring complex architectural concepts into focus for younger children. Using embedded audio-visual content and a series of physical interactives, content such as architectural plans, models and drawings were rearticulated and brought to life. Creating these interactives was a collaborative process, informed by research into child psychology and by a series of workshops where children were invited to engage with a range of materials and describe what architectural drawings meant to them.

From this basis, Nissen Richards Studio created two intersecting design languages. Firstly, a vertical walling system, which held the majority of display objects along the perimeter of the exhibition space. Within the walls, apertures then created a sense of architectural fragments, reflecting the shape of windows or doors, and offering moments to stop and look closer at content.

This was complemented by a series of tables which were a contemporary interpretation of the original tables designed by Sverre Fehn for his famous Skadalen School. These tables held the majority of the interactives and created a language of play and fun that ran throughout the experience. Visitors to these tables were invited to use blocks to furnish the interior of a school, whilst elsewhere they created connections between a 2D plan and a 3D building by matching architectural fragments to the drawing.

The colour choice and the materiality of the exhibition were also informed by advance workshops with local children, utilising the bright colours and tactile feel that the children in the workshops were repeatedly drawn to. Both design decisions also aimed to create a sense of nostalgia for older visitors and to transport people back to the post-war era.

The exhibition is complemented by a series of installations, including two scaled-up architectural fragments which create an introductory threshold into the exhibition, a series of longer-form film installations in the building’s vaults and a textile play installation by Studio Ossidiana which children were encouraged to rearrange, offering them agency to control their own play-space.