How we made the dozens & trails app for the library of birmingham | app story

The Library of Birmingham opened in 2013 to international fanfare. With its dramatic architectural features and extensive public spaces, it attracted millions of visitors in its opening

year. As well as the miles of books on display, one of the star features of the library is its "golden box" – a secure, environmentally controlled storage facility housing hundreds

of thousands of archive, heritage and photography items. But how do you make such a vast collection of manuscripts, books, maps and artefacts accessible to a casual visitor? And how do you

connect them all to the present day? One of the solutions is, of course, digital technology. The Library of Birmingham worked with our company, Nymbol, to create an app and a Kinect

(gesture-driven) interactive screen within the building that serve as fun and visual introductions to its vast collections. We needed to find a way of making the library's archive

collections, books and exhibitions available to everyone, as well as making the most of the vast knowledge, passions and expertise of library staff. We worked hard to think about how users

might discover content and how they could interact with it. The result, Dozens & Trails, takes a selection of gems, surprises and curiosities hidden in the library's collections –

such as maps, books, manuscripts, images and so on – and groups them in quirky ways that people can explore at their leisure. "Dozens" are groups of 12 related items representing

different aspects of the library, pulled together with an interesting common link. For example, we have 12 vivid examples of second world war poster propaganda grouped together, while

younger visitors can find 12 of the best "gross out" children's books at the library. "Trails" consist of 12 artefacts, photographs or landmarks, each located on a

map which together form a trail around the city. Users can use the app to view these different places as they looked in the early days of photography and see archival material to learn about

their history. Current trails include Birmingham's anti-slavery landmarks, a tour of city life living on sixpence a day during the 18th and 19th centuries, and a more contemporary side

of Birmingham following sculptures around the city. The app allows people to come across unexpected things usually hidden from public view. For example, the Mucker concert hall is

Birmingham's only surviving Victorian music hall. Located near the Bullring shopping centre, audiences would load up with cheap fruit and veg from the outdoor markets to hurl at

performers. We have a copy of a programme from 1884 that you can find on the app and then discover in the library itself. The Dozens and Trails app also allows visitors to purchase prints of

historical posters, maps and photographs, adding a commercial element to it. It has been an ambitious project. A major challenge was curating content for a mobile audience: short, concise,

informative and engaging content that could provide a taster of the library's collections. Also, we wanted to bring together the voices of many staff from across the building and

celebrate their passions, expertise and interests. As such, we had to move away from the usual method of content development by one central team, to having many different authors. To tackle

this, in collaboration with the digital content and innovation teams at the library, we developed style and user guides to allow all members of staff to participate. The content management

system was developed to allow the library to take full ownership of content publishing, so they didn't have to keep coming back to us for specialist technical know-how. Dozens &

Trails received 1,500 downloads in its first three months and is still growing. It started out just featuring the library's own collections, but now it incorporates content inspired by

the library's partners, so English Heritage, the Birmingham Museums Trust and the Media Archive for Central England have all provided archival material. The library is constantly

uploading new material to the app and there is a special Tolkien trail planned for release next month to coincide with the new Hobbit film. This trail will connect places from Tolkien's

home and school life as well as places that inspired his books. The author is such a hero of Birmingham, it seems apt that he should get his own trail. APP FACTS LENGTH OF THE PROJECT:

eight months COMPANIES INVOLVED: Nymbol and the Library of Birmingham SIZE OF THE TEAM: one technical director, two designers, one content strategist, one project manager, six digital

content and innovation team members, plus staff from across the library MORE APP STORIES How we made the Show and Tell circus app for children with autism How we made The War Poetry of

Wilfred Owen app for iPad How we made Lumo Deliveries Inc _Rebecca Bartlett and Mark Steadman are members of the digital team at __Nymbol__, which you can follow on Twitter __@nymbol_ JOIN

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