The Louisiana Children’s Museum is preparing to move from the downtown Warehouse Arts District to a new state of the art facility in City Park. The site, behind the New Orleans Museum of Art, borders one of the Park’s lagoons and offers an entirely new direction for the institution, where children can discover the outdoors and engage in nature in ways they were never able to in the downtown location. Sustainable site strategies and a LEED Silver facility will teach children lessons about nature and the environment.

Designed with MITHUN of Seattle, WA, the new museum program is distributed into two linked buildings that are carefully sited to protect existing live oaks while embracing the lagoon and open space for environmental education. The choreography of the visitor experience connects people and nature – moving through groves of live oaks, across water and into the courtyard and sensory gardens beyond. The co-location of a two-story wing with centers for literacy, parenting, early childhood research and environmental education creates a holistic and supportive environment for families.