• About
  • Where Does It Hurt?
  • Project Portfolio
  • CV
  • Contact
Menu

rainey tisdale

interpretive and strategic planning | content and collections curation | institutional capacity building | creative process
  • About
  • Where Does It Hurt?
  • Project Portfolio
  • CV
  • Contact

Americans today are still grappling with much unfinished business that has its roots in the European settlement of this continent. In collaboration with Michelle Moon, I am currently leading a multi-year interpretive planning effort at Historic Huguenot Street that attends to this unfinished business.

April 1, 2024

Feeling our way toward reparative interpretation at Historic Huguenot Street

Read More
In Workshops, Planning, Prototyping, Coaching, Capacity Building, Experience Design, Organizational Culture, Collections, Teaching Creativity, Placemaking, Interpreting Local Places, Exhibitions, Emotion, Creative Practice, Content Development

In 2022 The Frick Pittsburgh invited Michelle Moon and me to lead an interpretive planning effort to reimagine the visitor experience for Clayton, the Frick Pittsburgh’s Gilded Age Mansion. The result was award-winning.

September 29, 2023

Critical thinking on labor, industry, and capitalism at the Frick Pittsburgh

Read More
In Workshops, Planning, Prototyping, Coaching, Capacity Building, Experience Design, Organizational Culture, Collections, Teaching Creativity, Emotion, Creative Practice, Content Development, Applying Social Science, Interpreting Local Places, Interpreting Cities

Using a new experimental model of creative strategic planning, Laura Roberts and I collaborated on a living plan for Cambridge Historical Society that resulted in a name change to History Cambridge, stronger organizational decision-making capacity, and a commitment to history in the service of social cohesion.

November 28, 2022

Transforming History Cambridge through creative strategic planning

Read More
In Workshops, Planning, Prototyping, Coaching, Capacity Building, Organizational Culture, Collections, Creative Practice, Interpreting Cities, Interpreting Local Places, Teaching Creativity, Applying Social Science

August 1, 2019

Collections stewardship and sustainability at Oysterponds Historical Society

Read More
In Collections, Planning, Interpreting Local Places, Placemaking, Coaching

Museums need a new model for collections stewardship. This is the core idea that animates my work with Active Collections co-founders Trevor Jones and Elee Wood.

June 1, 2019

Imagining a new model for collections stewardship

Read More
In Collections, Workshops, Coaching, Capacity Building, Applying Social Science

May 1, 2019

Creative adaptation at the 1867 DeLong House in Glen Falls, NY

Read More
In Exhibitions, Planning, Workshops, Interpreting Local Places, Placemaking, Teaching Creativity, Prototyping, Experience Design, Coaching, Capacity Building, Collections, Emotion, Organizational Culture

April 1, 2019

Leading the museum community in healing after the Boston Marathon Bombing

Read More
In Collections, Planning, Exhibitions, Interpreting Local Places, Content Development, Emotion, Experience Design, Interpreting Cities

Visitor Comments:

“A great place for healing”

“Thank you for holding us with care.”

“Thank you for this closure. I truly needed it.”

“This is my one outlet for my grief.”

“I came thinking of myself and left thinking of you.”

“I’ve felt so lost—now because of this I am found.”

March 1, 2019

Dear Boston: Messages from the Makeshift Memorial

Read More
In Emotion, Exhibitions, Collections, Content Development, Experience Design, Interpreting Local Places, Interpreting Cities, Creative Practice

“When coaching TED and TEDx speakers, we often emphasize that the most successful TED Talks aren’t merely presentations. They’re acts of sharing that combine authority and vulnerability. Rainey nailed both parts: authority in that she knew her material cold and was the only person in the world who could tell that story, and vulnerability in that she really lets the audience in and feel what it was like to live through such an emotionally charged assignment.” —Jimmy Guterman, TEDxBoston

February 1, 2019

Our Year of Mourning

Read More
In Emotion, Exhibitions, Collections, Interpreting Local Places, Content Development, Interpreting Cities

January 1, 2019

You Are Here: Archiving Providence in the Present

Read More
In Collections, Exhibitions, Interpreting Local Places, Content Development, Emotion, Prototyping, Interpreting Cities, Experience Design, Creative Practice

December 1, 2018

Teaching professional conversationalists how to speak with objects

Read More
In Exhibitions, Creative Practice, Placemaking, Prototyping, Content Development, Collections, Organizational Culture
MappingRevolutionaryBostonScreenshot.png

November 1, 2018

Prototyping new technologies for interpreting local history

Read More
In Interpreting Local Places, Content Development, Prototyping, Interpreting Cities, Experience Design, Collections