Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
Founded in 1897, the Cooper Hewitt remains the only American museum exclusively focused on design. In 1970, it moved from the third floor of the Cooper Union’s Foundation Building to its current home, the Andrew Carnegie Mansion, at Ninety-First Street and Fifth Avenue, on the north end of Central Park. Although Carnegie asked his architects, Babb, Cook & Willard, for the “most modest, plainest, and most roomy house in New York,” the Georgian Revival structure was anything but modest when construction was completed, in 1902. It was the first American residence built with a steel frame and included a private elevator and central heating. Formally gifted to the Smithsonian Institution by the Carnegie Corporation of New York in 1972, the house underwent renovations in 1976 so that it could open as a public museum. This was followed by work in 1988 to make the complex wheelchair accessible and in 1998 to link the mansion to the adjacent Miller and Fox town houses. Then, after decades of piecemeal renovations, the museum underwent a comprehensive overhaul, including an expansion and preservation as well as a revitalization of its garden.
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