Ocean Journey Aquarium

Denver, Colorado
Completed

Breakthrough technological and interactive exhibits enhance the dynamic story-telling of the Ocean Journey.

Client

Colorado's Ocean Journey

Project size

110,000 sf

Professional Services

Architecture
Landscape Architecture

Colorado’s Ocean Journey is an interactive aquarium, presenting the story of water, its qualities and characteristics, and its journey from the mountains to the sea through various fragile ecosystems and climactic zones. The facility tells two contrasting stories, one based locally in Colorado, where a drop of water feeds the entire western United States, and a similar mountain source in Indonesia, that runs through the endangered rain forests to the Indian Ocean.

Colorado’s Ocean Journey incorporates the latest in interactive exhibit, with hands-on displays, explanatory wayfinding, and a total interactive experience, incorporating
visual, sound, temperature and humidity. Exhibits range from traditional jewel tanks to large acrylic-windowed ocean tanks to replicated mountain habitat to aviary and marine mammal habitat. Total capacity is approximately one million gallons of water. The exhibit presentations at Ocean Journey are represented as dynamic environments, with immense rock canyons, waterfalls, surprise flash foods, dense rain forests draped with vines, and sky lighted spaces filled with live plants and birds. In addition to the immersion experience, sound effects, changes in humidity and temperature, audio/visual effects add to the realism of the journey.