And I think the interpretation doesn’t come by a zoo designer designing an exhibit and then finishing it and then saying, well, I’ve got a piece of wall here, which you can put a graphic on and got a piece of space here, which you could put a touchscreen on. Read More
I think it has to be part of the whole design process where the, not educators, but interpreters need to get in there right at the beginning with the initial designers and the zoologists, the curators, and come up with this, what’s the purpose of this exhibit?… Read More
They’re actually quite cool. So they’re really not wild animals at all. They are actors in a film set. Zoos have set that conservation education research are important for zoos. Read More
What should be the primary goal of a zoo aquarium and why?… Read More
I think conservation is probably the only reason that you can justify keeping animals in captivity. And it’s not necessary conservation through captive breeding or ex situ conservation or supporting in situ conservation. But I think basically it’s interpretation and interpreting to the visitors how important it is to conserve… Read More
You said that zoo animals are like characters in a film. Read More
What did you mean?… Read More
Well, I don’t know if I was thinking of the life at that time when I said that, but I think that zoo animals are obviously not wild animals. They’ve been taken from the wild, so their ancestry is from the wild, but they’re very different from wild animals as… Read More
Why and why was it important?… Read More
Well, it comes back to this sort of creative design team and the creative design groups I used to develop. And I think it’s important to bring in people from outside the industry to not necessarily advise you, but to throw you ideas. And as I say, my skill, if… Read More
I think it was a stupid idea. I didn’t want polar bears. My chairman wanted polar bears. And he had bumped into a guy called Jim Dolan in San Diego on one of his previous tours before I’d ever been with him. And they were looking at… For some of… Read More
And so that was it. And being a pretty forceful guy, he said, “Let’s do the polar bears.” And we didn’t have actually enough money even to do something, which was large enough. But anyway, and that was one of our first, one of our early exhibits. And even now,… Read More
You used to invite people to discuss how the zoo could be more inviting. Read More
When you decided to have polar bears in Singapore, were there objections?… Read More
Were you criticized?… Read More
And why did you choose to move forward with the exhibit?… Read More
Well, I think I come from the School of Zoo Design, which is basically set up by Hancocks and John Coe, Jones & Jones in the 1976 long range plan of the Woodland Park Zoo, which David Hancock commissioned, and he chose Jones & Jones, which is a landscape company… Read More
That’s the point. I’m doing a PhD right now and what I’m doing is if it’s looking at great exhibits around the world and asking zoo people about which they think is a great exhibit, and then trying to analyze why it’s a great exhibit. And in fact, I’ve probably… Read More
If they’re based somewhere in Central Asia, they go to Tashkent and some of the other zoos around there and Almaty and they say, “Well, this is the kind of yardstick that we’re following.” If they’re fortunate enough to be based in Southeast Asia, hopefully they go to Singapore Zoo… Read More
It’s difficult for other departments who are not a zoo to even start fathoming why zoos tend to be a little bit schizophrenic. Read More