A Letter from Meghan

Dear Friends of the Museum,

Summer SURE is here!!!  

Here at the Utica Children’s Museum though, we’re thinking cool thoughts and want to talk to you about WINTER!

You have all been waiting patiently for an opening date for the museum and now we are ready to share that the ALL NEW Utica Children’s Museum will open our doors in... DECEMBER! 

What an amazing project it has been to re-imagine the museum! We’ve worked with world-renowned museum designers to create galleries and exhibits that reflect our community, inviting visitors to “Love Where You Live!” We’ve constructed our 4,000 sq. ft. rotunda and renovated the entire 10,000 sq. ft. second floor at ICAN’s Family Resource Center – both of these new spaces will be the new home of our museum. We’ve worked with local artists and students to give our brand a whole new look. Now, we embark on the final stage - fabricating and installing each piece to see it all come to life!

Conceptual and planning meetings with our internal teams, Hands On! Studio and our board of directors

It has taken some time, but all great things do!

This is going to be a one-of-a-kind experience for YOU! Each piece of the museum is custom fabricated specifically for us… meaning the entire project is being built from scratch! 

Our national team of experts is hard at work all along the East Coast – from here in Upstate NY to Philadelphia and all the way down to Florida. There are six galleries and 60 exhibits within them to build… that’s a LOT of pieces that need to come together! We’re working with our designers and fabricators to get it juuuuuust right, and we promise it will be worth the wait! 

We are creating a welcoming place for children and families to enjoy, learn and play for generations to come… and we take that responsibility VERY seriously!

Construction of the new rotunda addition on the south side of the building and a complete renovation of the entire second floor

Every single piece in the museum has a purpose and needs to come together perfectly. We’re also designing the museum with Universal Design – the first in the country to do so from concept through completion – so every visitor has the best and most comfortable experience possible. This approach addresses barriers that are typically overlooked in the design process, which means we’re fine tuning and tweaking pieces as we go, right up until we open our doors and beyond. 

So… what happens between now and December? 

You can expect to see trucks arriving on the Parkway in the coming months and then the install team gets to work! We’ll definitely be sharing the excitement in real time as it happens, so be sure to stay tuned to our emails, Facebook and Instagram. 

We want to thank our team and our many local partners – including our families, kids, donors and members of the community – for supporting us every step of the way, for providing imperative input in the process, and for believing in the immense value that a new children’s museum will provide our region.

Local arts professionals and local high school students took part in the co-creation of the new museum brand!

We can’t wait to share our ALL NEW MUSEUM with you and welcome you through our doors this year!

Thank you and we'll see you soon!
Meghan Fraser McGrogran

Small group tours, our brand launch, our 100 Plates. One Table. fundraiser and School Break events have taken place in the space