Museum of Diversity Jamaica

Project Context

Following the success of the Commonwealth Youth Programme virtual museum, I was commissioned to design the actual physical building in Jamaica — a permanent institution dedicated to Black and diaspora histories through immersive technology. Having built them a digital home, I was then asked to design the real one.

This is a museum of the future anchored in the deep past. I served as sole conceptual designer. All research, design development, Revit and Rhino modeling, CAD drawings, 3D renderings, and schematic walkthroughs are my work.

What Was at Stake

Jamaica’s first people, the Taíno, were nearly completely erased through colonization. Their culture, symbols, and knowledge systems were systematically destroyed. A museum dedicated to Black and diaspora histories that ignored the indigenous people who were there first would be quietly repeating that erasure — even with the best intentions.

Getting this wrong would not be merely a design mistake. It would be a political and moral one, embedded permanently in the building’s structure.

Structural Complexity

Cultural. Taíno history is fragmented — there is no complete, continuous record to draw from. Designing from incomplete history without distorting, romanticizing, or appropriating it required careful and sustained research judgment.

Institutional. The building had to operationalize the Museum of Diversity’s five core values simultaneously — Duty, Inclusion, Vision, Equity, Respect — and make those values spatially legible, not just stated on a wall.

Technical. The building needed to function as both a traditional museum and a flexible, future-proof media environment capable of evolving as technology changes.

Political. Choosing the Taíno as the conceptual foundation is a deliberate statement — this museum begins before slavery, before colonization. That is a repositioning of where Black diaspora history starts, and it carries weight.

Representational. There was consistent pressure to flatten or conventionalize the cultural references. My role included holding the line on what was historically defensible versus what was visually convenient.

My Role

I conducted all research into Taíno iconography and cultural history, developed the entire design language, and produced all Revit and Rhino models, CAD drawings, schematic floor plans, 3D renderings, and walkthrough animations used for institutional presentations and fundraising.

Specific Decisions I Made

I chose the broken Taíno sun — not a whole, perfect sun, but a fractured one — as the organizing symbol. A broken symbol used honestly is more truthful than a pristine one. The histories this museum holds are also fragmented. The form had to say that directly.

I used the fragments of the sun as the literal architectural floor plan. Each fragment becomes a distinct programmatic zone: Dialogue Rooms, Equity Labs, archive spaces, future labs. The geometry is not decorative — it generates the building’s entire organizational logic.

I made the gaps between fragments intentional. The voids between sun pieces become courtyards, light wells, and transition zones. Visitors physically move through absence as well as presence. The empty space represents what was lost — and holds it honestly rather than papering over it.

I designed all gallery volumes as flexible black-box spaces with no fixed technology built in, so the museum can upgrade its storytelling tools as technology evolves without requiring structural renovation.

I created sightlines across the building that physically connect Caribbean narratives to broader diaspora geographies — visitors can look across the building and see different cultural neighbourhoods, reinforcing the museum’s connective purpose spatially.

Directions not taken

A pan-African aesthetic using kente patterns or Adinkra symbols — rejected because this would centre West African heritage over Caribbean and indigenous histories specifically, which is a form of erasure in its own right. A contemporary ‘museum of the future’ architectural language — sleek, glass, minimal — rejected because that aesthetic carries its own cultural assumptions and would erase the indigenous grounding the institution needs. Representing Taíno culture decoratively rather than structurally — rejected because decoration is easy to remove. Structure is the argument.

My Judgment

Fragmented histories are not shameful gaps to be hidden or filled in with guesswork. They are the actual material of the work. The design had to make that legible spatially — so visitors feel the incompleteness as meaningful, not as failure or oversight.

Indigenous knowledge systems and immersive digital technology are not opposing forces. They are both methods of preserving and transmitting what matters across time. A museum of the future does not have to forget the deep past to face forward.

Outcome

The conceptual framework gave the Museum of Diversity a culturally rooted, architecturally defensible foundation for a building currently in development. By anchoring the design in the Taíno — Jamaica’s first people — the museum’s origin story begins before colonization, which is itself an act of historical restoration embedded in the architecture.

The design directly supports the institution’s fundraising efforts: the concept provides both a compelling visual identity and a principled cultural argument for institutional investment. The building can function simultaneously as a sanctuary for dignity and a platform for celebration because the geometry allows for tonal gradation — moving from solemn archive spaces through vibrant communal gathering areas to speculative, forward-looking installations.