The leisure and attractions industries have always caught the eye of the rich and famous. It’s no coincidence that musicians and film stars invest in restaurants, build hotels and buy ski resorts and Caribbean islands or that philanthropists have sunk parts of their fortunes into building some of the world’s most incredible museums and galleries as legacies.
As times change, people acquire their wealth by different means and their passions – to an extent – define the kinds of attractions which get built. This is particularly the case in the US, where huge wealth resides with a small elite – The One Percent. The Victorians explored, hunted, researched and catalogued the world as never before, so philanthropic collections from this era are heavy on the taxidermy. They were great art lovers, so we have galleries filled with amazing paintings and portraits.
In this issue, we look at the new philanthropists – the people influencing the direction in which the industry develops by their choice of funding and their passions. The first – the newly opened Bezos Centre for Innovation at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle, Washington State, US – is featured on see page 30.
The attraction, part-funded by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and his wife MacKenzie, includes content which shares and celebrates Seattle’s entrepreneurial achievements: the city is home to a significant number of successful corporations, from Boeing to Microsoft – and Amazon of course.
Money from tech is driving many developments and skewing the attractions sector towards technology, with Google one of the most prominent donors. On page 48 we look at MoMath – the Museum of Mathematics in New York City, which had a US$2m donation from the internet giant.
Each year, through its charitable arm, Google Giving, the company donates US$100m (E72.4m, £59.6m) in grants, as well as 50,000 hours support and $1bn (E724m, £596m) in product to good causes, making it a significant force in third sector funding and attractions are in the front line to benefit.
These days, in addition to philanthropy, there’s a broader than ever range of routes by which attractions come into existence, from crowd funding sources like Kickstarter to corporatelands and everything in between. Fittingly – in this age of the cult of personality – we even have attractions which focus on a celebrity: football star Christiano Ronaldo has opened a museum dedicated to himself on his home island of Madeira, Portugal as a gift to fans, for example.
But tech is hot and the emerging tech elite have shown intent to do good with their money, so donations from this source will continue to have an impact. When you consider that the Facebook flotation alone created 1,000 dollar millionaires, it’s clear the money’s there, meaning we’re likely to see more tech-related attractions receiving funding as the new philanthropists hit their stride.
