Wayward, in partnership with graphic designers Project Projects, have been selected for the National Parks Now fellowship with the Van Alen Institute in New York and the US National Park Service. The initiative is to develop case studies for attracting diverse audiences, telling new stories, and engaging the next generation of visitors at a time of fast-evolving technologies, regional contexts, and audience expectations. The National Parks Now sites tell complex stories about one of the country’s densest and most diverse urban regions, containing countless layers of the nation’s economic, ecological, and cultural history. National Parks Now looks to propose a broad range of interventions to create new experiences that connect these parks to larger, more diverse audiences throughout the region, and develop a model for similar parks nationwide.
By focusing not on capital projects that require huge investments of time and resources but rather calling for a nimbler range of engagement, outreach, and experiential strategies, National Parks Now provided an opportunity for teams to truly push the boundaries of what national parks can be in the 21st century.