't Grom: Reviving a Local Museum Through Service Design
Redesigned a struggling Belgian vegetable museum into an interactive, story-driven experience that teaches visitors about food, sustainability, and culture through a service design lens.
Project goals
’t Grom is a heritage museum in Sint-Katelijne-Waver, Belgium, dedicated to the story of local vegetables and hands-on workshops like baking and botanical drawing. Despite its cultural value, the museum faced declining visitor numbers and growing financial pressure.
The project was introduced as part of my bachelor’s final assignment after the museum reached out to our university. Stakeholders were at a crossroads: either reinvent the museum experience to reconnect with modern audiences or close and repurpose the space entirely.
Service Design Approach
I approached ’t Grom not as a collection of exhibits but as a complete visitor experience. Using service design methods like personas, journey mapping, and site flow analysis, I explored how people moved through the space, what they felt at each step, and where the experience fell short.
Based on these insights, I restructured the experience around three key phases:
Arrival: A clearer starting point with welcoming signage and improved wayfinding to guide visitors from the entrance.
Immersion: A central route that follows the journey from seed to food to waste, supported by interactive moments and hands-on storytelling.
Extension: A lasting takeaway through recipes, seed packets, and invitations to community events, encouraging visitors to stay engaged even after their visit.
This new flow positioned ’t Grom as a place for learning, creativity, and connection rooted in local pride.
Designing the Experience in Space
While this project was guided by service design methods, it was also the final project for my interior design bachelor’s degree. In my last year, I focused on service design as a specialty, which helped me bridge spatial thinking with human-centered design.
I did not just imagine how visitors would feel, I designed the space to support that experience.
I developed the complete interior layout for one of the museum’s buildings, Midzeelhoeve 2. This included exhibit zones, visitor flow, and interactive installations that followed the story of seed to waste. I considered materials, lighting, furniture, and acoustics. I also scripted what visitors would hear in each room to strengthen the atmosphere.
This was not just a floor plan. It was a layered experience, carefully crafted room by room.
Reflection
Designing for a museum is more than arranging walls and objects. It’s about crafting a story people can walk through.
This project pushed me to connect interior design with branding, storytelling, and service thinking. It showed me how space can hold meaning and how a designer can shape not just environments, but the entire experience.
That’s what made this project so rewarding.
