Nov
09
2026
This past weekend, we joined the community in celebrating the “History in Motion” museum campus expansion, where the San Mateo County Historical Association opened a series of exhibitions in the Historic 1910 Courthouse in downtown Redwood City. It was great to see so many people turn out for the ribbon-cutting!
Ideum collaborated with the Association to reimagine the HERO (Hannig Environmental Research Organization) Natural History Gallery. The new exhibition, Digging into the Past: The Peninsula’s Natural History, explores the Peninsula's prehistoric landscapes and Ice Age wildlife. At its center is a reconstruction of Neoparadoxia, a 15-million-year-old marine mammal found during construction at Stanford's Linear Accelerator Center. The skeleton is displayed in a large case anchoring the center of the gallery. The gallery also includes a life-sized Columbian mammoth, a giant short-faced bear, and a northern elephant seal. Along with these large scenic elements, our team and partners developed a number of interactive exhibits, from digital experiences to more traditional physical installations.
Designed and developed by the team at Ideum, the gallery’s colorful custom cabinetry houses artifacts and interactives while featuring a powder-coated aluminum cladding for a durable, seamless finish. The cabinets both display signage and support hands-on digital interactives. These interactives run on Ideum Inline displays, our large-format touch displays built to be integrated into custom cabinetry, and provide visitors a further look into the exhibit.
This permanent exhibition is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday (closed Mondays) at the San Mateo County History Museum’s Courthouse location in downtown Redwood City. The museum describes itself as one that “depicts the natural and human history of the Peninsula– from prehistoric animals and its original people to today.” Stop by to see the rest of the Peninsula’s prehistoric past for yourself!
We will share more details about our exhibit design process, our partners, and the exhibition’s especially interesting elements in a future post. If you are interested in learning more about Ideum’s exhibit design services, please reach out to our sales team; we’d love to bring your story to life.
