Sara Thacher
Experience designer, Disney Imagineer
Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser, The Jejune Institute, Haunted Mansion: Ghost Post, The Optimist
Education[edit]
Thacher studied glass at the Rhode Island School of Design and earned a Masters of Fine Arts in Social Practice at the California College of the Arts.[2][3]
Career[edit]
Thacher was one of the creators of the multi-chapter interactive experience The Jejune Institute[4] in San Francisco, with Jeff Hull and Uriah Findley. She served as a lead producer and experience designer for Nonchalance after answering a Craigslist recruiting ad.[5][3] She is featured in the 2013 documentary about The Jejune Institute, The Institute.
She later worked for The Go Game[3] and was a producer and designer on FutureCoast, a future forecasting game by World Without Oil's Ken Eklund that ran in February 2014.[6] FutureCoast was funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation to Columbia University's Polar Partnership.[7]
The game explored climate change, its effect on polar ice, and rising sea levels through a series of voicemails from the future.[8] The game also used in-person experiences, geocached items, and social media to engage audiences.[7][9]
Thacher works as a senior creative director and research and development Imagineer at Walt Disney Imagineering. Her work includes creative leadership on the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser two-day immersive Disney experience,[10] the Themed Entertainment Association Award-winning Haunted Mansion: Ghost Post,[11][12][13] and alternate reality game The Optimist,[14] a game set around Anaheim, California and inside Disneyland that served as a promotional tie-in to the 2015 film Tomorrowland.[15]