Visit the Sugar Hill Children's Museum of Art and Storytelling
/After being underwhelmed by another pop-up this past weekend (I REALLY need to stick with my no-pop-ups-with-fees pledge), our day was wholly improved by a long overdue first visit to the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art and Storytelling in Upper Manhattan.
The museum is STUNNING and the activities on offer are amazing. I highly, 100% recommend a visit and then I recommend visiting again and again.
About the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum
The Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art and Storytelling opened on St. Nicholas Avenue at West 155th Street in late 2015. Developed by Broadway Housing Communities, the museum has become the “cultural heart” of the Sugar Hill Project, an initiative within the community to pair permanent housing with early education and educational advocacy and access to the arts. Per the museum’s website, the space is located at “the crossroads of the traditionally African American neighborhood of Harlem and the immigrant, largely Latino communities of Washington Heights.”
And the museum “provides our culturally rich neighborhood with a space where children and their families grow and learn about Sugar Hill, and about the world at large, through inter-generational dialogue with artists, art and storytelling.”
It is this mix of learning and doing that makes the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum so special. On your visit, your kids will make art as well as view art, and they can listen to stories as well as write their own stories. And all the while, the communities surrounding the Sugar Hill Project will be featured and celebrated.
About the Design of the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum
The Sugar Hill Children’s Museum is such a treat to visit as a parent, in large part, due to its absolutely gorgeous design by famed architect, David Adjaye. Among other things, Mr. Adjaye designed the breathtaking National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver. Here, Mr. Adjaye designed the entirety of the Sugar Hill Project’s building, including the museum that takes up the building’s bottom floors.
The interior of the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum is as stunning as the exterior. As I said to my husband on our visit, its design encompasses my three favorite “Ms” - it’s Modern, Minimalist and includes touches of Metallic.
Witnessing Mr. Adjaye’s talent here in NYC is reason enough for any adult to visit the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum. And as I discuss in the next section, the art on view is yet another reason why I think a visit is enjoyable for adults as much as kids.
About the Art of the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum
When you walk down the stairs into the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum, you are immediately greeted by large scale artworks. (My husband actually asked me: “Are you sure this is a children’s museum?”)
On our visit, the beautiful artwork featured in the main area was a series by Colombian artist, Tatiana Arocha, called Respiro Un Bosque/I Breathe A Forest. These gorgeous black and white murals with pops of metallic gold feature many animals; and so nearby, children were asked to create their own whimsical animal puppets. Guests could also listen in on music and some words by the artist’s father describing life in Colombia.
In the same main area (aka the Lobby), there were also building blocks to play with and murals to which to add your own details.
Moving into a gallery off of the main area, we saw tremendous works by the late Fredrick J. Brown titled, Dreams and the Possibility of…
In another gallery, on view just through the end of this month, is Heather Hart’s child friendly, The Oracle of Amplitude. We had seen one of Ms. Hart’s Oracle works years ago at Storm King Art Center, so it was a real treat to get to see and interact with another one today.
And on the other side of the main area are Studio Labs, where kids can continue their immersive experience by drawing and coloring and cutting and painting. Just as we were leaving, a guided art project was about to start in the Studios.
About the Storytelling of the Sugar Hill Children’s Museum
The second focus of the museum is storytelling, and to that effect, every day it’s open, the museum offers an immersive performance or story time guaranteed to excite the younger guests.
Head over on a Friday afternoon at 3:30pm for “Virtuous Journeys” story-time. On Saturdays at 1pm the museum puts on Showtime Saturdays with Alexander Elisa, where guests “move [their] bod[ies], make music and be[come] a part of the story.” And on Sundays at 1pm, join Sunday Fundays and “sing, dance and play with the magical musical stories performed.”
We sadly couldn’t stay long enough for the performance on our visit but my girls still enjoyed creating their own performance with the whimsical animal puppets they made.
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The Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art and Storytelling is located at 898 St. Nicholas Avenue at 155th Street in Manhattan. It is open only on Thursdays to Sundays from 10am to 5pm.
Kids aged 8 and under are free to enter, youth aged 9 to 17 are $4 and adults are $7.
