It has been a year since we launched Designing for Accessibility, a community-centered project that aims to transform the museum into a more welcoming and accessible place for all visitors. Over the course of the project, the museum will serve as a living laboratory for innovation—fostering meaningful connections between the disability community, museum staff, designers, and the public. The goal: to ensure that visitors with disabilities can access and experience the museum on their own terms and thrive in a welcoming environment for all.
“Nothing about us, without us” continues to be the project team’s guiding principle as we’ve seen the power and impact of collaborating closely with Denver’s disability communities on museum accessibility. Our focus for the first project year has been taking stock of our current accessibility standing as an institution and collaborating with our community to envision a more accessible museum experience. Between September 2024 and August 2025, the project team completed these goals through three main activities:
- Listening Sessions: We hosted two listening sessions in March and April 2025 with the goal of building relationships and better understanding how visitors with disabilities experience the DAM. Co-facilitated by six leaders from the disability community, and with 25 attendees, the sessions involved group discussions and gallery explorations to identify accessibility barriers and opportunities.
- Staff and Volunteer Survey: We conducted a staff and volunteer survey to establish a baseline measurement of DAM staff and volunteers’ understanding of incorporating accessible practices into their work. This helps us to better understand their relationship to access and disability.
- Working Group: We convened a group of 11 community partners with lived experience of disability for monthly meetings to identify barriers, brainstorm solutions, and prototype accessible exhibition designs in collaboration with local designer Matt Gesualdi. The group will act as co-designers to develop prototypes for accessible seating and signage that will be used in the Designing for Accessibility Showcase exhibition and improve accessibility museum-wide.
Design Working Group Members
- Anmol Bhatia
- Aziza Rodriguez
- Beth Marshall
- Christine Markman
- Cori Pepelnjak
- Dan Burke
- Javier Flores
- Jocelyn Roy
- Kendall Hagar
- Nadelle Payne
- Sue Shusterman
Key Trends
Throughout the project we have worked with Trainer Evaluation to analyze data from these rich sources of feedback and have identified three key trends:
Provide a (More) Accessible Visitor Experience
We heard from staff, volunteers, and community partners that full access to museum spaces, exhibitions, and programs by visitors with disabilities is crucial. In response to the question, “Where do you feel the most welcome and included?” one listening session participant replied, “Places where I don’t have to be anyone other than myself.”
Visitors confirmed that accessibility accommodations at the DAM (like closed-captioning, verbal description and alt text, and even in-gallery seating) can help them to engage with artworks and interpretation to make their experience of the museum more meaningful. While visitors applauded the current DAM accommodations, they requested more consistency of these accessibility features across all galleries and enhanced communication of these accommodations. As one survey participant said, “Publicly displaying our commitment to accessibility and what accommodations we offer is JUST as important as being accessible in the first place.”
Additionally, DAM staff and visitors agree that the museum’s physical environment, especially the interior gallery doors which are not power-assist or automatic, can be a barrier to navigating the museum independently.
We Need to Build Capacity
In general, we heard that staff and volunteers view the DAM as committed to accessibility, however many asked for more support in understanding how accessibility relates to their work. Most respondents identified the need for institutional policies and best practices that would offer guidance on how accessibility can be incorporated into their project planning and workflow. This request was most common amongst DAM staff and departments who do not interact with visitors on a regular basis. While we were pleased to learn that visitor-facing staff are more confident in their knowledge of disabilities, we recognize that everyone on staff should be equipped to support visitors with disabilities. As one survey participant said, “The DAM can show its commitment to accessibility by continue to make it a museum-wide responsibility.” We know that staff and volunteer training plays an important role in helping all of us find success in this area.
Disability Visibility and Representation Matters
Representation continues to be an incredibly important aspect of the work we do at the DAM. When it comes to people with disabilities, how can we make sure they are represented not only by staff and volunteers who make up the museum, but also through the art and artists represented on the gallery walls? We heard from our listening session participants that seeing themselves represented in the museum makes them feel welcome and a sense of belonging. We know that when people with disabilities are included in our decision-making this can result in a culture change that prioritizes their perspectives and experiences.
As we move into year two of this project, we are excited to build on these learnings. The results of the survey will be shared with DAM staff and volunteers and inform the development of training resources. The Design Working Group will continue to meet monthly through 2025 to fabricate accessible design prototypes that will be on-view in the Design Studio in 2026.
Learn more about the Denver Art Museum’s commitment to accessibility on our website or by contacting access@DenverArtMuseum.org.
