Queens Museum (NYC & Co)
Sept. 23, 2021 By Allie Griffin
The city has allocated $26.4 million for the Queens Museum to complete its expansion project which includes a children’s museum space, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Wednesday.
The investment enables the Queens Museum to create a dedicated children’s museum space, secure artwork storage and additional classrooms — all features of the expansion project.
“The Queens Museum is a world-class institution, and this funding will help them grow and develop their footprint in Queens and throughout the city,” de Blasio said.
The plan is the second half of the museum’s expansion project. The museum completed the first half — which created an additional 50,000 square feet of galleries, event spaces, educational areas, and visitor amenities, as well as site work and facilities systems upgrades — in November 2013.
The second and final phase of the expansion project consists of five distinct elements — new educational classrooms/ workshop areas on the first and second floors; a 5,500-square-foot intergenerational, multilingual family art lab; a 2,600-square-foot art storage vault; reconstruction of the southern wall and window system and new offices, exhibition prep spaces and study area for back-of-house operations.
The additional classrooms will allow the museum to accommodate more school trips and educational programming and the climate-controlled, secure storage space will protect the museum’s 15,000 objects and accommodate future pieces.
Additionally, the project includes plans to upgrade the museum’s HVAC system to improve its energy conservation and cost savings.
The president and executive director of the Queens Museum thanked the mayor and his team for the investment.
“We could not be more grateful to the de Blasio administration…,” President and Executive Director Sally Tallant said in a statement. “Together, we will deliver a multilingual, intergenerational arts and culture learning center – a Queens Children’s Museum – as a part of the completion of the Queens Museum.”
This initiative was made possible by the office of Mayor de Blasio, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, City Council, and the Queens Borough President’s Office.
“As both the Queens Borough President and the father of a young child, I could not be more excited to have worked with our partners to turn the Queens Museum’s longtime dream of a space dedicated to our borough’s kids into a reality,” said Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, Jr.
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