What deserves to be in a design museum?

At the entrance of the Cooper Hewitt design museum’s latest exhibition, Acquired! Shaping the National Design Collection, two objects sit side-by-side. One is a 3D-printed model of a coronavirus particle, 2020; the other is a turquoise lotus-shaped cup, circa 1100 BCE, from Egypt—the oldest object in the museum’s collection.  Lotus-shaped Cup (Egypt), ca. 1100 BCE and Model of the COVID-19 Coronavirus, 2020 [Photo: © Smithsonian Institution] “It brings together two things that are...