Museum Remodels

Exploration Place closing until spring, but work will be done

Jul 8, 2020 | 3:17 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – The doors to Exploration Place have been closed to the public since March 13th and, after a recent meeting, the Board of Trustees made a tough decision. The doors will remain shuts until the spring of 2021.

“It was a tough decision because we know how much the facility and our organization means to the community,” explains Shauna Harper, Co-Chair of the Board, who says it was absolutely in the best interests of the community to remain closed. The programs will still be offered online.

However, this does not mean the lights are out in the facility.

There are some significant plans to renovate the building. The current entrance, foyer and gift shop will become a Palaeo-Garden with a living wall and there will be a major expansion of the Animal Ambassador Program. The small theatre in what is currently the rotunda will become the gift shop and the new entrance. The Ted Williams History Hall will be re-configured with more room for in-house exhibits drawing on the collection and archives of over 1,000,000 entries, and a new space will be created to showcase indigenous material culture and traditional ways of knowing.

“While it looks like a break, it’s the time we’re investing into the building, investing int making it bigger and better than before,” said Harper.

The Early Explorers Preschool or Fort George Explorers After School Care Programs will not be operating this fall.

“This part of our physical closure is particularly devastating to me,” said Tracy Calogheros, CEO of Exploration Place. “We have been offering camps since 1996 and Out of School Care since 2001. However, the very same environment that makes those programs unique is working against us in a world where high-touch surfaces and closed air handling systems are unsafe. We will be embarking on a fundraising campaign to secure the necessary funds to reinvent ourselves once again, better, more modern and safer.”

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