Compete for a coveted Golden Stanchion!

Museums have extraordinary reach – and extraordinary trust. More than 850 million members of the public and 55 million school children visit museums each year, and museums, together with libraries, rank among the institutions Americans trust most as sources of information. With that reach comes an opportunity: What if we challenged ourselves to use the exhibition experience to tackle some of the biggest issues facing our communities?

As co-leads of AAM’s Exhibitions Affinity Community, we’re excited to announce a new way to do exactly that:

Part exhibition design challenge, part science fair, and part friendly competition, the AAMies are designed to celebrate what our field does best: turning big ideas into meaningful experiences visitors can actually have.

And yes, there will be trophies. More specifically, the Golden Stanchion.

A challenge for exhibition makers

Each year, the AAMies will pose a challenge to the museum field around an issue where exhibitions – the distinctly human, physical, place-based experiences museums create – can make an impact.

Then we want you to show us what you would do about it.

Museum professionals and exhibition makers will submit concepts for a small, working exhibit responding to the challenge. A jury will select finalists, who will then actually build their ideas and bring them to the AAM Annual Meeting, transforming a portion of the Expo Hall into a lively showcase of experimentation, interaction, and exhibition design.

Expo attendees will be able to experience the exhibits, talk with the people who created them, and vote on the winners.

Think museum exhibition science fair.

We want to see ideas. We want to see prototypes. We want to see things visitors can touch, try, respond to, talk about, and perhaps even steal – the ideas, that is – and adapt at their own institutions.

2027 Challenge: Fostering Human Connections

For the inaugural AAMies, culminating at the 2027 AAM Annual Meeting in Houston, we are asking exhibition makers to respond to a challenge that feels particularly urgent:

Fostering Human Connections: Exhibits that combat social isolation and encourage visitors to interact with friends or strangers.

Museums are among the increasingly rare places where people with different backgrounds, experiences, beliefs, and perspectives still regularly share physical space.

What could we do with that?

Could an exhibit make it easier for two strangers to start a conversation? Could it encourage a family to learn something new about one another? Could it create a moment of cooperation, humor, vulnerability, curiosity, or shared accomplishment? Could the design of an exhibition itself help strengthen the social connections that research increasingly tells us are essential to healthy people and healthy communities?

We want to see your answer.

You don’t need a fabrication shop or a giant budget to participate

One thing was important to us from the beginning: the AAMies should reward ideas, not resources.

We are also creating separate competition categories to make room for the range of resources and expertise across our field, including small museum exhibits, large museum exhibits, and entries from exhibition design and production studios.

The preliminary round is entirely digital. Entrants will submit a description of their concept along with whatever imagery best communicates it – sketches, renderings, photographs, diagrams, or similar materials. You do not need to fabricate anything to enter, and there is no expectation that teams spend money developing their preliminary proposal.

The point isn’t polish. The point is a great idea that might actually work.

What makes an AAMie-worthy exhibit?

We’ll be looking for four things:

Originality. Does the idea push beyond what we’re already doing?

Impact. Could it make a meaningful difference for visitors or for the museum field?

Feasibility. Could this actually be built, used, replicated, or adapted?

Experience. Importantly: would visitors have a great quality experience?

Those criteria reflect something we believe deeply about exhibition work: innovation isn’t simply about using a new technology or creating something nobody has seen before. Innovation happens when a new idea meaningfully improves the experience we create for people.

How to Apply

Complete this this application form by December 1, 2026. (There is a “save and continue” feature at the end of the form, if you want to complete it in more than one stint.)

And then: Houston.

Finalists will be invited to turn their proposals into working exhibits for the 2027 AAM MuseumExpo.

That means attendees won’t simply hear presentations about promising ideas. They’ll get to experience them and vote on them.

At designated times, finalist teams will be on hand to meet visitors, answer questions, compare approaches, and talk shop. MuseumExpo visitors will choose the winning entries.

And the winners?

They will receive museum exhibition professionals’ soon-to-be most coveted honor:

The Golden Stanchion

Because, really, what other trophy could it possibly be? Every finalist is a winner, too, and will receive the almost-as-coveted Pink Stanchion.

Why we’re doing this

We love awards that recognize extraordinary work already accomplished. But with the AAMies, we wanted to create something a little different: an award that helps generate the work that comes next.

We want to create a space where exhibition professionals can experiment without needing a multimillion-dollar project behind them. We want a brilliant idea developed at a six-person museum to be able to sit beside one from a major institution or design firm.

We want Annual Meeting attendees to leave MuseumExpo saying, “We could try that.”

And we want to demonstrate something we believe about exhibitions: they are not simply containers for content. They are one of the most powerful tools museums have for shaping how people encounter ideas, places, and one another.

Each year, we plan to develop a new challenge around an important issue facing museums and the communities we serve, inviting our field to experiment with what the exhibition medium itself can contribute.

For year one, that challenge is human connection.

So start sketching. Call your favorite designer. Rope in an educator, a fabricator, a visitor researcher, a curator, or the colleague who always has the slightly ridiculous idea that somehow turns out to be brilliant.

What could you create in a few square feet that might help people connect?

We can’t wait to find out.

The Rules and Timeline

Design Constraints

Size: Proposed exhibits can be a maximum of 5 ft x 5 ft. All entries must only be within the provided 5 ft. x 5 ft. area of the expo hall. Each exhibit will have no less than 4’ of standing room around the exhibit for visitors.

Electricity: No electrical hookups will be provided. Any electronics in your display must rely on battery power. If you choose to include battery-powered elements, you will be responsible for ensuring your exhibit has battery power during the conference.

Wifi: No wifi or data hookups will be available

Entry Categories

Reflecting the diversity of institutions in the museum field, and to even the playing field due to varying resources, the AAMies has three distinct competitive groups, which are:

1) Small Museum Exhibit – Entries with a production cost of under $500. (budget required with application)

2) Large Museum Exhibit – Entries with a production cost over $500.

3) Exhibition Design and Production Studios – Entries from organizations that are not museums

2026/27 Timeline:

• September 28, 2026: Applications open
• Information webinar: October 14 from 3:00-4:00pm ET (register here)
• December 1, 2026: Competition preliminary submissions deadline
• January 2026: Finalists announced
• May 5-8: Finalists entries displayed at the 2027 Annual meeting & MuseumExpo in Houston. AAMies awards announced at ceremony during conference and new theme announced.

—Jon Goldman & Jen Tobias
Co-Leads, AAM Exhibitions Affinity Community