Invention at Play was a highly interactive, engaging, and surprising exhibition that focused on the similarities between the ways children and adults play and the creative processes used by innovators in science and technology. It departed from traditional representations of inventors as extraordinary geniuses who are “not like us‚” to celebrate the creative skills and processes that are familiar and accessible to all people.

Originally opened in 2002, the original version of Invention at Play has now closed permanently. A smaller version of the exhibition lives on, however, at the Tech Museum in San Jose, California.