(Photo via Explore! Children’s Museum of Washington, DC)
D.C. is finally getting another children’s museum. But first, the National Portrait Gallery will provide a yearlong preview.
On January 28, the gallery will open its first-ever space dedicated to kids. Explore! with the Portrait Gallery is a partnership between the gallery and Explore! Children’s Museum of Washington, DC—a forthcoming venue by real estate developer and philanthropist Jane Cafritz.
At the exhibit, children (accompanied by an adult) can take over a portion of the Portrait Gallery’s first level. They’ll be able to experiment with portraiture by tracing silhouettes, posing for art pieces, and building faces out of illustrated blocks. The activities are geared toward children ages 18 months to eight years old.
One of the project’s goals is to attract more donors for the construction of the permanent museum, according to the Washington Business Journal, which reported that Cafritz will open the full-blown museum on land that the Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation is developing in Fort Totten.
For three decades, the District was home to a children’s museum on H Street. The Capital Children’s Museum was renamed the National Children’s Museum in 2003 before its crumbling 19th-century building shuttered in 2004.
The museum then opened a “Launch Zone” in National Harbor in 2009 for children to test exhibits before the full museum opened up in 2012.
But after two years, the National Harbor facility closed and museum officials announced that the space was moving back to the District because of “challenges such as lack of nearby public transportation, available space, and affordable options to expand the building.” Officials said they were searching for a new location in the city and that the museum would reopen in 2015, but that has yet to come to fruition. A spokesperson for the museum told WBJ that a downtown space has been identified, but didn’t offer any more details.
Meanwhile, Explore! Children’s Museum of Washington, DC is slated to open in mid-2019, according to WBJ. It will cater to infants and children up to 12 years old.
The preview exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery will be open on Tuesdays through Sundays from 11:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., but those hours are subject to change.
