Kristofer Helgen, president and CEO of Bishop Museum, got his first experience on the 14-acre campus in the Kapālama-Kalihi district about 25 years ago, when he was starting his Ph.D. in Australia.
He focuses on studying mammals and has discovered about 100 new species, including the olinguito. Expeditions have taken him to New Guinea, Indonesia, the Philippines, the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and parts of South America and Africa, but some discoveries also take place at museums.
During his first visit to Bishop Museum, the campus made an impression immediately.
“It’s always been one of my favorite places to come, both for its connection to my scholarly pursuits and my love of learning [and] it's one-of-a-kind uniqueness," Helgen told Aloha State Daily in early June.
Bishop Museum, which was founded in 1889 by Charles Reed Bishop in honor of his late wife, Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop, has a collection of more than 25 million items, including specimens, cultural objects, photographs and films, works of art, audio recordings and manuscripts. The museum is one of the world’s largest collections and is set apart from peer museums because it was founded in Hawaiʻi during the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, he said.
“It remains a museum by and for Hawaiʻi," Helgen added. "And amongst all the peer institutions that are similar, it's the only one that was not set up specifically in a colonial center of power. It's entirely different from almost all of our corresponding museum peers. That is an extraordinary thing.”
The nonprofit museum had about $28 million in total revenue for the calendar year ending June 30, 2025, according to the latest Form 990 available online. Most of that money comes from grants or contributions, which in FY2025 totaled about $23.8 million, or 84% of the total revenue.
Helgen joined Bishop Museum almost a year ago, on Aug. 1, 2025, succeeding interim CEO Dee Jay Mailer. Since then, the museum has opened Tūtū’s Place by Highway Inn, hired staff members, and partnered with the Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture & Design to serve as one of two museum partners that are transportation hubs for the center, which is located in a residential neighborhood.
Looking ahead, Helgen plans to prioritize revitalizing historical buildings and digitizing the collection at Bishop Museum. The museum is also planning to expand its staff and is opening recruitment searches for three new natural sciences curators. It recently hired a marine biologist and is in the process of bringing on a new botanist and entomologist.
"Ea Mai ʻEiwa: Patterns of Practice” is a special exhibit now on display at Bishop Museum which features the work of a trio of Hilo-based artists: Nālani Kanakaʻole, her husband, Sig Zane, and their son, Kūhaʻoʻīmaikalani Zane. Photo by Kelsey Kukaua Medeiros (Aloha State Daily Staff) 
Tūtū’s Place by Highway Inn offers Hawaiian food at the Bishop Museum. Photo by Kelsey Kukaua Medeiros (Aloha State Daily Staff) 
The president and CEO's office that overlooks the nonprofit’s Great Lawn, which is a popular gathering spot for community events. Photo by Kelsey Kukaua Medeiros (Aloha State Daily Staff)
Prior to moving to Hawaiʻi with his wife and 12-year-old son, Helgen was the chief scientist and director of the Australian Museum Research Institute at the Australian Museum, where he oversaw 120 staff members in research and collections capacities.
“As a family, we have just been thrilled with the move to Hawaiʻi and the extraordinary spirit — the connection and welcome that we felt here,” he said. “It's just been a wonderful move.”
Helgen also previously worked at the Smithsonian Institution, where he was a research zoologist and curator for the division of mammals at the National Museum of Natural History, according to his LinkedIn profile.
He spoke with Aloha State Daily ahead of his one-year anniversary on the job.
There's so much to absorb when you come into a new organization. What has been the biggest thing you've learned in your first year? I had never lived here in Hawaiʻi before. I had a lot of connection to Bishop Museum, kind of what pulled me here like a magnet when the opportunity came. But there aren't many times in our lives and careers that we get to sort of transplant into a completely different cultural setting, and that is something that has just been absolutely thrilling for me. I've loved every minute.
Bishop Museum is such an important place for Hawaiʻi — for our understanding of history and culture and nature. One of the things that I've been learning most is the importance of the daily usage of ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi here on campus. ... Language is one of the most foundational aspects of place, and here at Bishop Museum, we are all about helping to connect to place and to ground to the very history of the land where we are on this campus. Every day, as I learn more of the daily uses of ʻŌlelo Hawaii around here, I learn more and more about Hawaiʻi.
What were some of the most urgent problems the nonprofit museum's board asked you to take on in this role? We have a lot of things that we want to do, and one of the things that has been really pressing is — like any historical museum — the fact that we have so many infrastructure needs. We have old buildings. We have huge collections that we have to steward with great responsibility.
What are you most proud of from the past year? A lot of things. It's all about the people here. It's all about the achievements of staff. I'm proud that I feel like there are many things that have a different feel on campus already since August [2025], when I took over, and some of those are easy to explain. For example, in that time, we've opened an actual restaurant on campus, Tūtū’s Place, and that's in partnership with Highway Inn. ... Likewise, with the gift shop, we started a new partnership with Hawaiian Council, [which owns and operates] Nā Mea Hawaiʻi, and so we have changed from a more generic provider to an entirely local set of business connections that stock that shop. As people may know, Nā Mea Hawaiʻi has had that presence at Ward Center for a long time, and that has now changed; they're no longer based at that location, so this is their location here at Bishop Museum. Having Highway Inn serving Hawaiian food every day and having Nā Mea Hawaiʻi here along with Sig Zane — those are just 'enter the door and feel a little bit different' aspects, but there are others, too.
Our team, especially in public programs and education, has been really focused on community engagement around reactivation or revitalization of particular core objects or pieces, things that have been behind the scenes for a long time. One we might have spoken about was the Aʻa, which was Prince Kūhiōʻs famous koa racing canoe, and so that gorgeous canoe was sort of rehabilitated by canoe experts. ... And in November, [the canoe] was launched back out into the ocean for a wonderful event with koa canoes from all around Hawaiʻi.
What's the biggest challenge you see facing the museum today? You mentioned infrastructure, is that No. 1, or are there others? I think that's the most pressing. For example, people know Hawaiian Hall, and when they think of Bishop [Museum], that's almost synonymous with imagining that wonderful volcanic stone building. But its sibling is Bishop Hall, just across the way here, that is the earlier building. ... As many know, Bishop Hall was the original site of Kamehameha Schools and remained a core site of the school and the boys school in particular through the 60s. I regularly meet people out in the community that know this campus in part because they went to school here. That has been a facet of this campus for [more than] 130 years, and so I bring up Bishop Hall, because right now it's closed to the public because the structure is not fit for any activity right now. ... This is part of my responsibility to revitalize this really important piece of Honolulu heritage, Hawaiʻi heritage, and figure out how to bring that back to life, especially as a community space.
... Bishop Hall is not at all our only need. A lot of the needs are less visible, and they have to do with collections facilities that are behind the scenes, but are aging or need to be updated to best practice. One thing we've done during this year is from scratch, we've gotten started and built a new warehouse facility on the Bernice and Kalihi street corner. It's brand new. It has air conditioning, humidity control. And that is a facility that, for example, we're going to move all the canoes into that space. For the first time in 100-plus years, we'll have a really museum best practice purpose facility fit to look after those extraordinary objects. The need to bring our campus up to modern standards is one of the things that's just most top of mind, and that includes spaces like Bishop Hall, that should be public and activated again, as well as core spaces where we look after our most important materials.
Are staff still working on digitizing collections? Digitization is one of those core priorities that we have here, too. When you think about museums and the responsibility that we have holding these materials in public trust — making them as accessible as we responsibly can is a really important piece of that. Museums have come to realize that digitization is a really important part of doing that. We can only, of course, showcase a very limited percentage of things in the museum out on the public displays, but by expanding our efforts to image and document data around materials behind the scenes that's how we are going to meet some of our commitments to the broader public — and the world at large — around accessing our materials.
Our digitization program started in earnest around five years ago. We've had smaller initiatives at times and now that is really gaining a lot of steam. ... It turns out — and this is so important for the public to realize — that the core most important resource that Hawaiʻi actually has to understand things like endangered [or] invasive species is part of the collections that are here. ... I'd like to see us even more involved in that scientific capacity — through digitization, through the genetic work that we do here at the museum — in creating tools that are really useful for the state to meet the moment in terms of conservation, climate, endangered species, biosecurity. The museum has a pretty strong future ahead in that.
Given your extensive research and expedition experience, what is the appeal of an administrative job? For the last 15 years, I've been ever more involved in museum management, and all along that's meant being a scientist and a scholar, working especially in Pacific communities. But, part of it came from realizing that my career would be focused on museums and becoming very excited about that. Many people don't necessarily realize that — particularly in the natural sciences — it's behind the scenes in the laboratories and collections of the world's biggest museums that some of the most important work is taking place. So, as I realized that and I moved up the ranks as a scientist, I noticed what people might notice in any workplace, which is that there were things that I wanted to see done maybe different or better or more efficiently.
What strategies have you implemented to help retain staff? Some of what we focused on as an executive team most strongly in this first year have been on the well-being of staff. And that's included a deep dive into benefits, paid time off — improving both of those things. Thinking about how we can support people in matching and saving. Thinking about what we can do with professional development. ... As much as I have aloha for the museum, I knew I had so much to learn, and that has meant that for much of my first year here, I've spent that time really listening, and through that listening, thinking about, 'What am I hearing that the museum does need most?' And just the fact that we are on a better financial footing than we were a few years ago, the staff has wanted to be able to feel that in their own life, connecting through to the work they're doing here and the stability that they feel.
You recently visited the British Museum. Can you share what brought you there? Are there items from Bishop Museum on loan there? Definitely! Top of the list was the Hawaiʻi a Kingdom Crossing Oceans exhibit that is at the British Museum in London. It was an extraordinary show, curated by Alice Christophe, who was previously a staff member here [at Bishop Museum] on our cultural team. ... She was able to work at the museum to put together an absolutely remarkable exhibit. ... It was closing on May 25 and I was there, including for the closing ceremony and protocol, and it gave me an opportunity to chat with Alice, others involved in the exhibition, other leadership at the museum, including their director, Nicholas Cullinan. And just thinking about the potential for interaction between British Museum — which has the largest set of Hawaiian objects outside of the Bishop Museum — and our museum. ... And yes, we do have a couple of things that were on loan to that wonderful exhibition, and they were specifically gorgeous silver pieces that were gifted from the Royal Family of the UK to the Royal Family of Hawaiʻi. ... And until this moment had never been back in the UK.
Looking ahead, what are your goals for the next five years? I want to continue, of course, our footing of being a well-managed museum. Obviously, that means a firm and strong, sustainable financial footing. I want to lean into our strengths, which include historical strengths like the role we play as a Pacific-wide museum role model with our peer museums around the Pacific region. And that might include more engagement and partnership, and fellowship opportunities, other ways of engaging with Pacific partners.
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Katie Helland can be reached at katie@alohastatedaily.com.
