The Research And Applications On Textile Souvenir Of Beijing Natural History Museum

All the information is collected at the field research in Beijing Museum of NaturalHistory. Based on that, this thesis is aimed to offer more insights into designing thedesired textile souvenirs for the visitors. Dating from the past, souvenirs sold at thenatural history museums have been playing a significant role in promoting a museum’sculture as well as in making economic gains for it. In the Western countries, thetechniques for developing natural history museum souvenir have become quitesophisticated. Among others, souvenir development and research department enjoys themost attention in museum operation system. In comparison, the link of souvenirdeveloping is rather weak in China. There is few progresses made in this area during thepast several years. Discoveries about the souvenir’s current situation can be summed upinto three aspects:1. Lacking varieties, each souvenir reflect little distinction.2. The absence of thorough classification amongst each category.3. No appropriate level of souvenir catering for the visitors of different age groupsis set. Moreover, after studying the participant’s responses from the fieldwork, thereappear some of their specific requests concerning the souvenirs, such as the souvenir’svalue in sense of being memorial, useful, entertaining, and interactive. The data alsoshows in which area the majority’s interest lies at the museum, which will be helpful todetermine the theme and form of the souvenirs. By drawing on the successful cases ofthe textile souvenirs’ development in the foreign natural history museums, with thecombination of BMNH’s own characteristics, my design concept is based on threeperspectives—care for nature, care for children’s well-being, care for the developmentof individual textile souvenir. In light of this, souvenirs should not only represent themuseum’s spirit, but also the idea of being memorial, useful, entertaining, andinteractive. Last but not least, levels of souvenirs will be set clearly for visitors ofvarious ages. Meanwhile, a relatively complete classification of the textile souvenirssystem is made in the paper.