The Morgan Library & Museum
Restructuring a museum website around what visitors came to do.
Role
Designer & Researcher
Timeline
3 months
Team
3 designers
We interviewed museum-goers, rebuilt the information architecture through card sorting and tree testing, and redesigned three responsive flows.
The challenge
Over time, content for each audience piled up until the structure stopped prioritizing anyone, including the visitor planning a trip.
visitors
Attract and inform people planning a visit
researchers
Give worldwide access to digital collections
themorgan.org
learners
Support online learning and programs
members & donors
Drive membership and fundraising
Research
We interviewed 6 museum-goers about planning, visiting and reflecting afterward, then used affinity mapping to find the patterns.
Affinity map of interview notes from 6 museum-goers
Clear ticket and event info. What’s on, what it costs and how to get in, without hunting.
Accurate, easy-to-find details. Hours, location and practical information they can trust.
Support across the journey. From planning a visit to reflecting on it afterward.
Plan
Key details buried in a bloated site
Book
Ticket, exhibition and event info hard to find and compare
Visit
Café, dining and shop scattered across the site
Reflect
Information overload across the whole site
Built from interview themes and card sort findings. What we designed for each stage is in Design.
Information architecture
We ran 6 card sorting sessions with 35 labels from the current site. Participants grouped content by what they wanted to do, not by department.
Labels used in the card sorts, taken from the current site
Familiar words win: museum terms like “Reading Room” and “Digital Facsimiles” caused confusion. Amenities need a home: café, dining and shop were scattered, and participants wanted them grouped.
Before
The structure we started with
After
The Morgan Library & Museum
Visit
Plan your visit
Tours
Tickets & admissions
Exhibitions & Events
Exhibitions
Events
Learn
Resources
Programs
Research
Collections
Research services
Amenities
new
Shop
Dining
Header: Buy tickets · Donate
Five goal-based sections in plain language, with ticket buying and donating always one click away.
average task success across 7 tree tests
7 of 10 tasks scored 85–100%. Visit tasks were the strongest: everyone found hours and tickets quickly.
Exhibitions & Events, Collections & Research, and Educational Programs caused the most confusion. Café, Shop and Garden overlapped between Visit and About, so we gave them their own Amenities section.
Design
Plan
Plan Your Visit, current exhibitions, and location and hours are surfaced right away. Dining moved under the new Amenities section, where card-sort participants expected it.
“As a first-time visitor, I want hours, location and what's on in one place, so I can plan my trip in minutes.”
Book
Admission, events and tours in one page with filters, sort and search. Checkout is a single step: date, time slot and ticket types.
“As a visitor planning a weekend trip, I want to see what's on and buy a timed ticket in one go, so I don't have to cross-check pages.”
Explore
All exhibition types are consolidated into one view with concise descriptions. An audio guide makes exhibitions more accessible during the visit.
“As a visitor deciding what to see, I want every current exhibition in one scannable list, so I can choose quickly.”
Desktop screens
Plan Your Visit, with Dining under the new Amenities section
One Tickets & Admissions page with filters
Single-step checkout: date, time slot, ticket types
Impact
What I learned
Design decisions get much stronger when they’re grounded in user research. Understanding how museum visitors actually plan and behave showed me how directly information architecture shapes usability, clarity and confidence.
