SEE IT: New $465M Museum Of Natural History Center Set To Open On UWS

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — The American Museum of Natural History's first new addition in nearly 25 years is slated to open next month after a process that started in 2014.

The Upper West Side museum's "Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation" will open to the public on May 4.

“We are thrilled to open this magnificent new resource and facility, especially as the City is more fully emerging from the pandemic period and people are eager for opportunities to learn, to be amazed, and to be inspired,” said Scott L. Bok, Chair of the Museum’s Board of Trustees, said in a news release.

The 230,000-square-foot, $465 million Gilder Center was announced nine years ago and includes six floors above ground, and one below. It creates 33 connections among 10 museum buildings to link the entire campus and also establishes a new entrance to the museum at Columbus Avenue and 79th Street in Theodore Roosevelt Park.

Upper West Siders who live in the area will be very familiar with the near decade of construction that has taken place within the park.

That construction has helped create the new center that will hold the Louis V. Gerstner, Jr. Collection Core, which establishes and displays the central role of scientific collections as evidence from "which knowledge is derived."

The area will include 3,000 objects that represent every area of the museum's collections in zoology, paleontology, geology, anthropology, and archaeology.

In a different section will be a 5,000-square-foot Insectarium, which will feature live insects, digital exhibits, models, and pinned specimens.

Other exhibits and areas of the Gilder Center will feature a butterfly vivarium, a 360-degree immersive science-and-art experience, and more.

Here are newly released photos of what you can expect to find in the newest addition to the famous Upper West Side museum.

You can find out more about the Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation on its website.