Guide

How to prepare your museum's collection for AI visitors

You do not need to digitise your whole collection before getting started. A handful of well-described objects, one person who can review them, and the answers your team already gives on the floor is enough for a useful first test.

Written by NuvoGuide. Reviewed 1 October 2026.

The preparation checklist

1. Choose a starting set. One gallery or a dozen objects is the right size for a first test. Do not wait until the whole collection is documented.
2. Give each object a consistent name. Use something that will not change when you rehang or renumber. A simple internal reference is all you need.
3. Describe what makes each piece distinctive. Colour, markings, damage, what it stands next to, anything that sets it apart from something similar nearby.
4. Write the answers your team already gives. Include what is known, what is uncertain, and what must never be said. If your curator would not put it on a label, do not put it here.
5. Confirm what you can use photographically. A photograph helps; check you have the right to use it for this purpose before uploading.
6. Note related objects. Groups and sequences add context that individual records cannot.
7. Name a reviewer. One person who can say yes or no to a sentence before it goes live. This role matters more than the size of the collection.
8. Name who keeps it current. Loans, rehangs, and new attributions happen. A record with no owner goes stale without anyone noticing.

Two different jobs: description and story

The description helps find the right object: what it looks like, what text or markings it carries, how it differs from the similar piece nearby. The story is what a visitor hears: the interpretation your museum stands behind. Mixing the two in a single field tends to produce either a poor match or a story the museum never approved. Keep them separate.

A completed example (fictional)

id: obj_river_bird
name: River bird bronze study
aliases: bronze bird | river bird
location: north-room
description: ringed bill, reed base, no wall label number
story:
  - Cast bronze study of a river bird
  - Placed to connect the gallery to the town's river trade
  - Maker not established; do not name one
note: Fictional demonstration record. Not a real accession.
related: obj_trade_map
status: on_display

Common mistakes

• A good photograph, nothing else. Images help with matching, but two similar objects need words that separate them.
• Text copied from Wikipedia. If your museum would not put it on a label, do not put it in the record.
• Treating two similar pieces as interchangeable. Each object needs its own entry if visitors need to tell them apart.
• Loans and off-display works left in an active record. Availability needs an owner and needs to be updated when things change.

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