Statue of Liberty Museum Booklet

S TAT UE of LIBERTY MUSEUM

STATUE of LIBERTY MUSEUM

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When I was asked to join the board of The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, I first hesitated as I didn’t need another project, but the more I read about The Lady and the passion of the people who made it happen through history, the more I realized what a huge honor it was.

Indeed, Lady Liberty is the symbol of everything America is about: freedom, hope, possibility, and resilience. It is She that millions of immigrants saw first as they arrived in this country, their hearts full of dreams for a better future. It is those people and their descendants that make our country so rich and so unique; it is to honor these people and the companies they created that I am coming to you.

I’m thrilled to help lead this project!

Diane von Furstenberg

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THIS MUSEUM

This is an exciting and historic day for The Statue of LibertyEllis Island Foundation and the National Park Service. Over our nearly 35 year relationship—the most successful public/ private partnership in U.S. history—we have focused on the restoration and preservation of our two greatest monuments to freedom and opportunity, the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. Today, we are here to announce and unveil the plans of a truly new endeavor for us—the construction of a brandnew building on Liberty Island—the beautiful, new Statue of Liberty Museum. This new building will be the most monumental addition to Liberty Island since the Statue herself.

This new Liberty Museum will incorporate many elements and artifacts from the current pedestal Museum, but will expand on her story, exploring more fully the broader story of the statue’s history and her meaning to Americans and people around the world. We are also excited that the new Statue of Liberty Museum will allow for universal access, free of additional security restrictions, giving all visitors the opportunity to have a more meaningful experience and deeper understanding of Lady Liberty.

We invite all Americans to join us in this exciting endeavor!

Stephen A. Briganti

John Piltzecker

President and CEO The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.

Superintendent Statue of Liberty National Monument and Ellis Island

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From afar, she beckons.

Our attention shifts from the city to her profile as we cross. From aboard, facing the sun, Liberty Enlightening the World is spectacular.

Ashore, she emerges from the trees on the island.

We marvel. From beneath, she is colossal.

The Fort’s weathered granite is flecked with her patina.

From atop, breezes fan views to the horizon.

Inside, she is tiny. The air is still. Surrounded by a giddy framework and gleaming copper, the rivets seem to have rivets. From within, voices echo.

Looking out from this floating garden, we ponder: what is Liberty? From here, we remember.

So many have gazed upon her and this place in wonder and hope before starting a new life.

This place.

Nicholas Garrison Partner FXFOWLE

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TERREPLEIN MUSEUM

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MUSEUM AS LANDSCAPE From the very first, the Museum was conceived as an extension of the park. At just 12 precious acres, the design seeks to harmonize and add to the experience of all visitors to this special island.

The design merges landscape and building. The park is lifted, creating a new, naturalized habitat above. Below, the Museum forms a new geology, revealing a sparkling vitrine for its showpiece: the Statue’s original torch.

Monumental steps engage and activate the formal, circular plaza. They provide sitting, climbing and viewing spaces towards the Statue and the plaza. The roof terrace echoes the promenade atop Fort Wood, affording spectacular panoramas of the island, the harbor, and the city beyond.

The project’s angular forms and spaces are shaped by views and the irregularity of the water’s edge. The fort turns inward: it is defensive, dark, and solid. The Museum is its opposite. The torch radiates outward, celebrating liberty.

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STONY CREEK GRANITE

COPPER-ZINC ALLOY

NATIVE PLANTINGS

BRONZE

PRECAST CONCRETE

BIRD-SAFE GLASS

HUDSON RIVER PALISADES

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MATERIAL CONNECTIONS Materials link past and future. The Museum employs the same “Stony Creek” granite chosen by Richard Morris Hunt for the Statue’s base. The building’s fascia is of a copper-zinc alloy, developed for cladding ship’s hulls. Its patina matches the monumental bronze doors of Fort Wood. All copper is recycled, from the same foundry that produced the copper for the Statue’s restoration.

Concrete exterior walls are vertically striated in reference to the nearby Palisades rising from the Hudson. Glass surfaces are low-iron and nonreflective. They are textured to ensure the safety of migrating birds.

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MUSEUM FLOOR PLAN 1

E X HIB IT

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B OO K S TO RE

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ADM INIS TRATIO N

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FRAMEWORKS Inspired by Bartholdi’s workshops, Eiffel’s structure and the beautiful scaffolding erected for the Statue’s restoration, the Museum’s interior features an exposed steel structure and simple concrete floors. As with the inside of the Statue, the building’s construction is revealed. Exhibits and displays are afforded theatrical, “black-box” settings.

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THE MUSEUM OF THE STATUTE OF LIBERTY Almost everyone on the entire earth has seen the Statue of Liberty. Its symbolic strength is felt and understood for people with hope for their Liberty and for those who live in places of Liberty. With the design of this new Museum we are creating ways for the visitors to the Statue of Liberty to better understand the astonishing challenges to its creation—the amazing places and events in which it has been called upon—and the sense of hopefulness that it provides to people everywhere.

It has been a great gift and an honor to design the exhibits for this Museum.

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Edwin Schlossberg Principal Designer ESI Design

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L I BER T Y S TA R M U R A L

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I M M ER S I V E T H EAT ER

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EN G AG EM EN T G A L L ERY

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I N S P I R AT I ON G A L L ERY

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Original armature bars in storage

Donor tablet location

Liberty Star mural location

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LIBERTY STAR MURAL At the Museum’s entrance there will be a magnificent mural, an artistic evocation inspired by yet another of America’s most meaningful symbols—the American Flag.

Fifty star sculptures, will be crafted from the original hand-forged iron bars created by engineer Gustave Eiffel (just before his tower in Paris), which supported the Statue of Liberty for 100 years and were removed and preserved during her 1986 centennial restoration.

Touchscreen panels will accompany the mural and allow visitors to read a narrative about the family, company or individual donor related to each star.

A few stars will honor the thousands of donors who contributed to the Museum.

It seems fitting that the bars that once supported the Statue of Liberty will now recognize the donors who support the Museum honoring her.

This exhibit will be on permanent view at the Liberty Museum, where our donors will be forever honored for their role in Liberty’s story.

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IMMERSIVE THEATER As an introduction to the Statue of Liberty and her Museum, visitors experience a dramatic multimedia event told in a series of three theaters. It opens with a scenic view of 1870s New York Harbor before the Statue graced the skyline, and progresses through how and why the Statue was created as a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States. In a dramatic shift of scale, visitors then find themselves inside the towering figure on an exhilarating fly-through of the Statue, immersed in a sweeping story of Constructing Liberty and the ideal she represents. The conclusion covers how, for over a century, the Statue has observed people’s struggles for liberty worldwide. Visitors hear that we all have a role to play in defining and advancing liberty and are challenged to reimagine liberty for their world today.

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ENGAGEMENT GALLERY Visitors can delve deeper into stories about the Statue’s construction and history, and explore the multifaceted, sometimes contested, ideal of liberty through artifacts, exhibits, media, and interactives. To create an immersive experience, the physical look and feel of the Gallery as well as the content suggest that visitors are moving though time and place—from the fragmented, sometimes competing ideas that led to the Statue’s design in 19th century France to her construction in a warehouse in Paris to her grand opening ceremony in New York in 1886 to Americans’ embrace of the Statue as their symbol of homeland and liberty in the 20th century.

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INSPIRATION GALLERY As the emotional culmination of the museum experience, visitors consider their own roles in liberty’s future in two highly engaging activities. The first commemorates the Statue as an icon of liberty and encourages visitors to see themselves as part of a worldwide discussion about liberty. The second invites visitors to add what liberty means to them, along with their photo and signature, to an ever-changing mosaic.

And finally, visitors experience up close the Statue’s most powerful artifact—the original torch—with the vista of Lady Liberty herself set against the stunning New York skyline.

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LI B E RT Y ’ S TO RCH

After the experience of creating an image of yourself with the Statue of Liberty, the final moment in the Museum exhibit creates a dramatic experience of beautiful views of the Statue of Liberty and New York Harbor along with the presence of the original Statue of Liberty Torch.

The scale of the Torch against these beautiful backgrounds creates the emotional excitement and importance of the Statue of Liberty and encourages the visitors to take a moment to be inspired to join all past visitors in our hope for the future.

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THE STATUE OF LIBERTY-ELLIS ISLAND FOUNDATION, INC. NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

Book design by FXFOWLE Photos courtesy of The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc. Renderings and drawings ©FXFOWLE and ©ESI Design.