Imagine Children's Museum
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Everett, Washington
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 Front entrance of the museum at Wall St. and Hoyt Ave. (2004-2022) | |
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| Established | 1991 |
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| Location | 1502 Wall Street Everett, Washington |
| Coordinates | 47°58′39″N 122°12′34″W / 47.97750°N 122.20944°W |
| Type | Children's museum |
| Website | www |
Imagine Children's Museum is a non-profit children's museum located in Everett, Washington, USA, near Seattle.
The museum was founded in 1991 as the Children's Museum of Snohomish County, as part of a countywide initiative to establish children-oriented places in Snohomish County by the county government's Children's Commission. It opened in 1993 at a storefront in nearby Marysville,[1] but was forced to move to a temporary space in downtown Everett in 1995.[2] The county government planned to locate the museum permanently at McCollum Park in Mill Creek, but plans fell through during the late 1990s, leading to a donation by the Schack family to fund a permanent museum in downtown Everett.[3]
The new $4.75 million museum, a former Everett Mutual Bank branch with 20,000 square feet (1,900 m2) of space, opened on October 17, 2004, and was renamed the Imagine Children's Museum.[4][5][6] In its first year at the expanded location, the museum reported an attendance of 146,000, more than quadruple its annual attendance at its temporary locations.[7] According to the museum's website, in 2019, the last full year before the pandemic, it served more than 248,000 people through the museum and outreach programming.[8]
In 2020, the museum announced plans for a four-story expansion that would add 47,000 square feet (4,400 m2) in the southern parking lot. Plans included a construction crane exhibit that would allow visitors inside the museum to step into the crane cab and pretend to be crane operators.[9]
The $25 million expansion project ultimately added a three-story expansion of 33,000 square feet (3,066 m2), doubling the museum's size. The LEED-certified building includes interactive, hands-on exhibit areas designed to promote children's active learning and healthy development through play. The expanded museum opened to members on August 19, 2022, and had a "soft opening" for the public on September 7, 2022. Its Grand Opening and Ribbon Cutting event took place on October 29, 2022.