At the Virginia Museum of Natural History, visitors are transported back 300 million years to a time when giant dragonflies, salamanders and centipedes populated the state. That’s the magic of “Uncovering Virginia,” one of the exhibits ThemeWorks fabricated for this Martinsville, Virginia attraction.
Through interactive displays and dynamic environments, ThemeWorks – with designers Reich and Petch and exhibit contractor Design & Production – recreates places and eras of Virginia’s dynamic natural history. ThemeWorks also crafted the “How Nature Works: Rocks” exhibit, with geologic replicas, models of tectonic movement, even a translucent model of an active volcano.
Across 15,000 square feet of exhibit space, visitors come to understand the epic forces that shaped Virginia’s natural environment, as well as the keys to protecting it.
PROJECT DETAILS
Project: Uncovering Virginia and How Nature Works
Designer: Reich and Petch
Client: Design & Production, Inc.
Size: 15,000 square feet (1,393 m2) of exhibit space
Photography: Jay Rosenblatt
Scope of Work: As the primary scenic fabricator, we worked with the exhibit prime contractor, Design & Production, Inc. to create all the scenic dioramas and select exhibit components. These included a simulated coal seam and coal bed display which was molded in the field, a coal swamp scene featuring recreated lycopods and other ancient plants, a highly realistic Solite Quarry diorama with modeled artificial rockwork and plants, fossil “books”, a trash pit reproduction, a fossil-intensive Chippokes cliff face reproduction, a see-through model of a volcano with animated light magma chambers, and large dimensional models of three plate tectonic conditions.