I’m on a pattern kick and have been for a while now. So while wandering around D.C. during my trip a couple weeks back, I couldn’t help but notice all of the cool patterns around the city. Here are just a few of the many that caught my eye:

1. Ceiling of the rotunda in the National Archives
2. Brass grate in the National Archives (in the hallway across from the rotunda)
3. Wrought iron gate on building near National Mall
   
4. Malachite sample in Natural History Museum
5. Pattern on painting (sorry: can’t tell which one!) in the National Gallery
6. Wine bottles in Berliner Bar: I thought these looked kind of like cross-stitching or pixel art
7. Granite sample in Natural History Museum

I’m not sure yet how these will influence my work, but at the very least I’d like them to influence my fashion sense. Maria’s post on Ugly/Pretty got me thinking that most of these could make for some pretty cool tights or maybe a skirt…

On my last trip to Washington DC I visited The International Spy Museum, another DC “edutainment” museum, like the Newseum, that costs a $18 entrance fee, but is well worth it due to its sleek, new design and fun atmosphere. (I love well designed museums.)

The museum includes a mix of fact and fiction, including true-life spy stories and some prominent television spy history as well. Exhibits like “The Secret History of History” explain early code making and historical spy missions. Most exhibits include interactive features that help to keep older children (and child-like adults) entertained.

Above: Museum guests break into a room during the Operation Spy adventure. Image from spymuseum.org.

If you are in for a little Carmen Sandiego-like adventure, I encourage you to get a $25 ticket that includes the Operation Spy adventure. This adventure isn’t really very educational, and could be written off as a silly gimmick, but I found that it’s fun for adults and older children. You have to break into a room and a safe, follow someone on a security camera, and more.

If you choose not to do the Spy adventure, the museum provides you with a mini-adventure of its own, asking to you choose and memorize a “spy identity” throughout your museum trip.

A piece of the Berlin Wall, on exhibit at the Newseum in Washington DC.

As you may know, I spent approximately the last week in Washington DC. This time around I enjoyed a day at the Newseum. Unfortunately, it’s one of the DC museums that actually costs money, but for that money you get interactive, clean, sleek design (unlike some of the less-updated museums, such as the Air & Space Museum).

The Newseum is one among a brand of new “edutainment” museums popping up in DC (the New York Times recently reviewed some of these museums here).

My favorite exhibit, “Today’s Front Pages”, was on the top floor.

The “Today’s Front Pages” exhibit at the Newseum.

“More than 500 newspapers transmit their front pages electronically to the Newseum every day. Up to 80 are enlarged and printed for display in this gallery — among them one from every state and the District of Columbia as well as a sampling of international newspapers. Additional front pages are displayed outside the Newseum on Pennsylvania Avenue” (newseum.org).

I also enjoyed the special exhibit on G-Men & Journalists, where I got to see the actual cabin that the Unabomber lived in (yes, this is exciting to me). My cousins (and my aunts, actually) really enjoyed making their own newscast, which was later availible for download online.

If you’d like, take a 3D tour of the museum here, but I recommend an in-person visit!

[tags] Newseum, museum, edutainment, education, entertainment, Washington DC, travel, review, children, news [/tags]