  In this article, we present and discuss a user-study prototype, developed for
Bakkehuset historic house museum in Copenhagen. We examine how the prototype -
a digital sound installation - can expand visitors' experiences of the house
and offer encounters with immaterial cultural heritage. Historic house museums
often hold back on utilizing digital communication tools inside the houses,
since a central purpose of this type of museum is to preserve an original
environment. Digital communication tools however hold great potential for
facilitating rich encounters with cultural heritage and in particular with the
immaterial aspects of museum collections and their histories. In this article
we present our design steps and choices, aiming at subtly and seamlessly adding
a digital dimension to a historic house. Based on qualitative interviews, we
evaluate how the sound installation at Bakkehuset is sensed, interpreted, and
used by visitors as part of their museum experience. In turn, we shed light on
the historic house museum as a distinct design context for designing hybrid
visitor experiences and point to the potentials of digital communication tools
in this context.
