New models of mountains museums between territorial identity and environmental culture

The paper deals with design for cultural heritage (in terms of strategy, exhibition design and museography) to enhance the environmental culture focusing on the mountain as a “repository place” of tangible and intangible environmental and cultural assets. In this last years we are witnessing an interesting change: from a traditional and nostalgic concept of mountain museums to new models based on innovative interpretations and unconventional experiences through contemporary communication registers. Herein the design exhibit approach becomes an interpreter of new models of narrative and mise-en-scène. The topics around the new concept of the mountain museum are diverse and heterogeneous, challenging and complex. In this essay we have chosen to concentrate the attention just to two case studies: the first one is paradigmatic-illustrative of a new way to conceive the mountain museum, a diffuse museum and declined in different sub-topics; the second one is strategic-applicative and it is about to “debut” in territory less touristic and known. About this last case: the strategic valorisation of the mountain territory that considers Sondrio city as a barycenter of that area, is the object of a research project the authors are involved in: AAA Museum Hub (Avventura/Adventure, Ambiente/Environment, Arrampicata/Climbing) in which the nascent museum CAST-Il Castello delle Storie di Montagna is included1. The work develops in two lines which provide for inside and outside museum actions: - metadesign actions: innovative scenarios for valorising the heritage, strategies and processes of generation of new models of cultural experience; - design actions: fine tuning of strategic and communicative systems (strategy, visual identity, signage, analog and digital maps) and exhibit systems (exhibit artefacts and multimedia devices for temporary exhibitions and cultural events).