Mohawk Institute Former Residential School Museum

From 1828 until its closing in 1970, the Mohawk Institute operated as an Indian Residential School. The residential school system in Canada sought to erase Indigenous culture, separating children from their families and subjecting them to horrific abuses. In 2025, the Mohawk Institute reopened to the public as an historic site and exhibition centre, dedicated to telling the truth about what happened there and serving as a place of healing and reconciliation for the tens of thousands of Indigenous children impacted by this system.

Lead by the Indigenous Curatorial Leadership Team of Tim Johnson and Rick Hill, Lord Cultural Resources and WeatherstonBruer Associates were engaged to provide exhibition planning and design services and to assist in the implementation of the project. The team conducted multiple consultation sessions with Survivors of the Mohawk Institute to ensure that their stories were accurately and respectfully represented. Lord developed an Interpretive Plan and Content Matrix that mapped stories throughout the building, revealing its history through the perspectives of the students who were sent there. Lord also helped coordinate and develop exhibition content along with Rick Hill. WeatherstonBruer Associates created the Concept Design package, including floorplans, concept sketches, renderings, and a 3D model of the building.

The completed exhibition design drew on the voices and experiences of children and Survivors to illustrate what life was like at the Institute and the lasting personal and social impacts of the residential school system. Several digital and interactive exhibits were incorporated, including audio listening stations where visitors hear from Survivors in their own words, immersive videos that unfold key stories, and a digital language interactive that allows visitors to learn words and phrases in the Indigenous languages children were once forbidden to speak.

In parallel, Lord developed an Exhibitions Operating Plan, including five-year attendance, operating income, and expenditure projections. This work began with an assessment of the Woodland Cultural Centre’s existing operations and research into leading practices across similar institutions. These findings provided a framework for understanding how the new Mohawk Institute Museum experience would integrate with and strengthen the Woodland Cultural Centre’s future operations, attendance, and revenue.

The Former Mohawk Institute Residential School opened to the public on Canada’s National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, September 20 2025.