The Reliving Room was a small room designed to create an immersive experience of life in Cefn Coed hospital before its decommissioning. Between January and June 2019 it was part of the Cefn Coed Remembered exhibition at Swansea Museum.

The room was made in part with pieces from the hospital itself. The door was from one of the ward rooms. We included a small cabinet, and pictures and other wall furniture that hung there.

Two of the walls were projection-mapped with videos that told stories about life in the hospital, narrated by staff who worked there. You can see these below.

Interaction was via a simple tangible interface. To each story there corresponded a small artefact – a peacock, a cube of snooker chalk, and a ‘glitter ball’ – on a plinth. Picking up one of these items caused the reliving room to switch to the story that relates to it. The story paused when you replaced it.

This interactive feature was a prototype. In the public exhibition, the room played the video stories in rotation rather than interactively.