Abstract:

The "Secret Spaces Design Workshop", organised by the Accademia delle Arti e delle Nuove Tecnologie (AANT) in Rome in March 2026, constitutes a Blended Intensive Programme (BIP) under the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union.

Led by Italian professor and architect Enrico di Munno, this workshop explored museums as venues for the holistic promotion of knowledge, social inclusion, and human development. In particular, it examined peripheral exhibition spaces, removed from major tourist routes (off-road), to attract diverse audiences through immersive and multisensory experiences that stimulate the senses and encourage active interactions with artworks.

The project delves into museology experiences within environments originally intended for other purposes, such as Museo Centrale Montemartini in Rome: a former thermoelectric power plant that now houses Roman antiquities amid an industrial backdrop, creating a dialogue between human artefacts separated by two millennia.

To this end, hybrid physical-digital interaction tools were considered, offering novel interpretations of artworks and activities designed to engage the full spectrum of perceptual capacities. Its development featured dual fieldwork: one group of students and professors analysed visitor-artwork interaction patterns within the exhibition space, while a second group gathered detailed sensory observations of the pieces to provide feedback to the first, optimising multisensory perceptual experiences through cross-feedback—the exchange of perceptions to enhance mutual analysis. Fieldwork revealed the diversity of visitor perceptions, transforming the exhibition experience into one that is both playful and pedagogical.

Hence, our students and professors from the Escuela Superior de Enseñanzas Técnicas at Universidad CEU Cardenal Herrera participated in this workshop organised by AANT in Rome. The interest was twofold: first, to engage in an interior design experience distinct from typical classroom activities; second, to relate it to the programme of the Interior Design and Ephemeral Spaces course in the Bachelor's Degree in Industrial Design Engineering and Product Development at CEU Cardenal Herrera University in Valencia, thereby completing student training.

In this way, we integrated the workshop into the course's teaching activities. During this one-week workshop, preceded by online preparatory sessions and concluded with an online final presentation of results, participating students explored key concepts such as effectively displaying objects, capturing visitor attention to the exhibition, understanding exhibited content, devising optimal explanatory strategies, and sharing sensory perceptions.

Thus, this approach fosters active participation among diverse publics through immersive and multisensory interactions, addressing educational challenges in international cooperation by integrating physical-digital tools to reinterpret artworks and fully stimulate perceptual capacities. It reflects our commitment to international initiatives that promote collaboration between universities and students from diverse backgrounds and disciplines.

Keywords:

BIP, exhibition, space, design, museum, inclusion, international.