Cooper-Hewitt Museum
2 East 91st Street
New York, NY 10128
(212) 849-8400 • 849-8351 Tours
http://cooperhewitt.org

The Cooper-Hewitt Museum is still closed for renovations. Meanwhile, the gift shop is open and the Museum is staging some exhibitions at other locations. Visit the official website, linked above, or call for further information.

Cooper-Hewitt is the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Design. Truly impressive in scope and purpose, this Museum, housed in the landmark Carnegie Mansion, includes 11,000 square feet of gallery space devoted to changing exhibitions that examine compelling issues of design, displaying its own collections as well as loans from public and private sources.

The Museum preserves, documents, and expands a collection of nearly 250,000 works in such fields as rare books, drawings and prints, textiles, wall coverings, furniture, ceramics, glass, metalwork, and jewelry. Areas of interest include graphic design, industrial design, and architecture.

The perspective is international, and the Museum's holdings encompass both historical and contemporary design and decoration. A democratic regard for mass-produced as well as one-of-a-kind objects lends a unique character to the collections.

This is a wonderful museum, and, with the Doris & Henry Dreyfuss Study Center containing more than 50,000 volumes and a Picture Library of over 1,000,000 images, it is an important resource for architects, designers, studio artists, craftsmen, and scholars.

The Museum is also a fine resource for enhancing the education of students in grades K through 12. School Programs organized in conjunction with current exhibitions encourage students to exercise their observational and critical thinking skills through sketching and design activities.

Visit this museum. Bring your family or your students. You'll want to go again.