For Poulomi Das, childhood was a walk in the museum. Her parents, renowned art historian Dr Asok Kumar Das and textile historian Dr Syamali, lived and breathed inside the four walls of museum spaces. It was but natural for Das to follow in their path, but she admits doing so reluctantly. "To me, museums seemed to function like ivory towers. I found them intensely boring—a place that had wooden-glass showcases with a lot of dead objects," says Mumbai-based Das, who is a consultant in the museum and heritage sector, and has over 20 years of experience in research and documentation of Indian arts, textiles and heritage. Strongly of the belief that "museums in India are governed by decadent colonial laws and are highly structured and sometimes even feudal, where the visitor is, sadly, not central to their vision and existence," Das has yearned to make them fun, inclusive and accessible to all.

The opportunity, she says, came when the lockdown was announced in March. As visiting faculty at a few design schools in the country, she was aware of how some of her students, who were living with depression, were having it rough during the forced isolation. "I was feeling helpless and claustrophobic myself," she recalls. On a whim, she put out a video on her art and heritage blog in April, asking people to share their favourite memory of any museum in the world. "The idea was to reach out to those who might have been forgotten, are isolated, depressed and lack access to museums or heritage sites. By opening up an undiscovered space, I wanted to give them something to look forward to in the future," says Das.