Madison Children's Museum
Madison, Wisconsin

Making the WilderNest | Water Exhibits | Hodge Podge Mahal | Tinkerer's Workshop | Roof Top | Log Cabin

Hodge Podge Mahal
This elaborate climber occupies a two-story space. Climb through the inside of a re-purposed buoy from Lake Michigan or a resored antique three-wheeled car from Argentina, up to a wooden pod like the inside of lute or a swinging hot-air ballon basket made of found iron peices, to zoom down the Dragon Slide (recycled, of course).

As it's name implies, it draws it's inspiration from a slew of sources -- the St. Louis City Museum's extravagant clambering structures, books about avant-garde treehouses, Ed Gardo's woven sculptures, even a part of the climber at our city zoo playground -- and takes off from there, a mashup of materials and visual associations.

The Hodge Podge Mahal climber is the Museum's largest internal structure and it's complexity and weight made it especially difficult to adapt to the existing architecture. A number of designs were explored and rejected before this direction was taken. One example: these photos (below) of in-progress models hint at some of the design options that we studied before the "cloud-planet" pod was finalized.

More so than many exhibits in MCM, the final form of this one emerged as the artisans struggled week by week. And this one will continue to evolve over time, as we learn how children use it, and especially when the third floor opens and can connect to the Hodge Podge Mahal at the top.

Making the WilderNest | Water Exhibits | Hodge Podge Mahal | Tinkerer's Workshop | Roof Top | Log Cabin

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