Interpreting Roxbury: The Untold History — Dillaway-Thomas House
"Interpreting Roxbury: The Untold History," a room-by-room historical reinterpretation of the 18th-century Dillaway-Thomas House in Roxbury Heritage State Park, Boston, Massachusetts, completed in 2019 after a multi-year restoration; exhibit design by Content • Design Collaborative, with fabrication by Mystic Scenic Studios and media installation by Northern Light Productions and New England Technology Group.
| Venue | Dillaway-Thomas House |
|---|---|
| Project type | Major Renovation |
| Status | Completed |
| Year completed | 2019 |
| Technologies | gestural touch interactive, digital media |
Credits
| Firm | Role | Note |
|---|---|---|
| content-design-collaborative | Exhibit Design | Interpretive planning and exhibit design; lead firm |
| Arrowstreet | Architecture | |
| leonardi-aray-architects | Architecture | |
| Mystic Custom Fabrication | Fabrication | Exhibit construction |
| Northern Light Productions | Content Production | Digital media and gestural touch-exhibit content |
| New England Technology Group, Inc. | AV Integration | Media installation |
| her-design | Environmental Graphics & Wayfinding |
Description
The house was restored between 2017 and 2019 and reinterpreted room by room, with each space assigned a different era of Roxbury history — the Parsons Kitchen (pre-Revolutionary War), the Thomas Gallery (Revolutionary War), the Dillaway Room, a Historic Hallway and 20th Century Roxbury Room, and an upstairs gallery on 21st Century Roxbury with community meeting space. The interpretive plan foregrounds Roxbury's own history, including African American history, rather than general Boston history. The project won a Boston Preservation Alliance 2020 Preservation Achievement Award.