Storytelling to Celebrate Organizational Growth and Economic Impact in New Jersey

New Jersey Community Capital (NJCC) wanted to showcase its long history of creating quality housing, educational facilities, and meaningful employment throughout New Jersey. Our team developed a two part installation to visualize NJCC’s financial investments for social and economic benefits across neighborhoods.We also crowdsourced partners and investors support across New Jersey’s neighborhoods.   

Context

How might we document a community development corporation’s rich history of investment and knowledge sharing for New Jersey residents and workers? We fabricated an installation that celebrates 27 years of organizational impact for its Silver Jubilee Gala. It told the stories of the people positively affected by NJCC,and narrated how investments have been used over the years to share how a growing network of collaborators look towards a successful future.

Approach

Our team aggregated and analyzed NJCC data, and catalogued the organization’s history to share compelling data-driven stories that chronicled NJCC’s growth. We humanized data by intersecting photos and storylines of people that directly benefited from NJCC’s work. These visual arrangements invited visitors to play with a timeline, organizing stories around historical moments. By using a large structure to walk around and engage with different stations, we created a gathering hub for people to learn from each other’s experiences with NJCC.

Outcome

Our work helped strengthen people’s existing connections to NJCC, and promoted a sense of pride in people for their contributions to education, financial, and social investments across New Jersey. We showed milestones and impact for NJCC, and crafted narratives that allowed people to feel a collective sense of belonging through their shared experiences, ideas, and missions.