During his tenure as director of the Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums, John Suau led the creation of the three-day symposium “Building Museums,” considered one of the industry’s most important professional education programs even today. After the success of the first three-hour workshop in 2003 in Albany, New York, John worked with the presenters to develop an in-depth symposium about creating new museum spaces.

Based on demand, the program was designed to engage constituents involved with capital museum projects, including architects, designers, directors, trustees, funders, and other types of museum service providers. The community quickly embraced the program and continues to develop the content to fit the needs of attendees. The symposium presents content based on three phases: vision, implementation, and sustainability. The content of each day reflected a broad range of museum sizes and scales, budgets, scopes of building projects, disciplines, and collecting versus non-collecting institutions.

It is one of the most attended international programs about building museums. The program continues to thrive today, some 15 years after its first presentation in 2004. The annual symposium was hosted in major cities at local museums until 2021, when COVID-19 forced most conferences, like Building Museums 2021, to be hosted virtually.

John worked with me while I was a board member of the Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums beginning in 2003. His can do attitude was a great catalyst to creating a new symposium on Building Museums in 2005. That program was launched to meet a specialized need in the field. John’s work on Building Museums laid the groundwork for a successful conference which has continued to serve museum professionals and service providers for over 10 years. 

Martha Morris, Associate Professor Emerita, George Washington University, Museum Studies, Washington, D.C.