sustainability – American Alliance of Museums

Rethinking Exhibition Mounts: Bio-Based Prototypes for Low-Carbon Display

By Nikoletta Karastathi and Alicia González-Lafita Pérez

This article first appeared in the journal Exhibition (Spring 2026) Vol. 45 No. 1 and is reproduced with permission. The need to find more sustainable ways of living first gained prominence in the 1970s, when the term “green” became …
Sustainability by Design

By Leslie Tom & Jeff Anderson

The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History is developing a museum-led model for people, planet, prosperity, and programs. At The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History (The Wright), our mission is to “open minds …
Sustainable Investing: A Practical Guide for Museums – Part 1

By Anna Raginskaya

Earlier this year a guest post on this blog advocated for museums harnessing their endowments to mission-related goals through a financial practice known as impact investing. In today’s post, Anna Raginskaya, Financial Advisor, Blue Rider …
How We Maximized Our Museum Building’s Impact on Human and Environmental Health

By Richard V. Piacentini

Abundant research demonstrates the efficacy of a building’s design to enhance and support human and environmental health. Peer-reviewed professional studies in journals such as Indoor and Built Environment, Journal of the Illuminating …
How I Rewrote the Future of the Anthropocene

By By Multiple Authors

The digital edition of Museum 2040 has been downloaded over 2000 times, and I’m tremendously encouraged by the feedback I’ve received from readers. As I’d hoped, museum people are using this exercise in immersive future fiction as a …
The Museum Sector and the Paris Agreement

By Sarah Sutton

Sarah Sutton is principal of Sustainable Museums, a museum consultancy. She is also a member of the PIC-Green Professional Network. The very day President Donald Trump announced that the United States would not sign on to the Paris climate …
When Leaders Won’t Lead: Taking Action on Climate Change

By Elizabeth Merritt

Museums can change the world, especially when they recruit their visitors to take action. When the Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site speaks out against mass incarceration, the B.B. King Museum fights for childhood health in …
Dream Big: the Alliance in an Age of Scale

By Elizabeth Merritt

I want to share with you the Alliance’s vision for how museums could play a major role in filling the need for high-quality, equitable early childhood education in the US. Back in June I blogged about the MacArthur Foundation’s …
FutureProofing Natural History Collections

By Elizabeth Merritt

When the Alliance chose financial sustainability as one of three areas of focus for our new strategic plan, I gravitated to one of the hardest challenges of all: how can we help create financially sustainable models for supporting …
Futurist Friday: Inventing the Edge-y Workplace

By Elizabeth Merritt

One of the themes I explore in TrendsWatch 2016 is the way cultural, economic and technological forces rapidly transforming the way we work. Our infrastructure, for the most part, hasn’t caught up. Here’s one workplace that …