As the next phase of renovation begins at the NC Museum of History, community input and interaction are at the forefront
by Ayn-Monique Klahre
If you’ve driven around downtown lately, you’ve probably noticed the fencing around the North Carolina History Museum building. The site has been closed for a year, so this more visible phase of its renovation has gotten locals asking what’s been going on, says C.J. Roberts, the executive director of the North Carolina Division of State History Museums. “We’ve been moving more than 150,000 artifacts, from the size of a pottery shard to an airplane!” he says. “It’s a Herculean task. Imagine packing your grandmother’s china — times 150,000.”
The museum recently released plans for the renovated museum, which will reorient the entrance toward the north side of Bicentennial Plaza, create a light-filled atrium and add classrooms and community spaces (in addition to doing infrastructure improvements to update accessibility, install new climate-control systems and repair leaks). From the outside point of view, the 1994 building will have bigger windows to tease what’s inside, plus wood cladding and other updated architectural details.
“The museum was sort of stopped in time,” says Roberts. “Today, there are 4 million more people in the state.” Over the last 30-plus years, he notes, North Carolina has become more diverse and the museum has continued to acquire artifacts, so part of the effort is interviewing communities around the state. “We want to tell a fuller story,” says Roberts. “We want to make sure we offer maximum value and relevance to residents of North Carolina.”
When the museum reopens, it will have many new features that guests have come to expect, like more digital displays and hands-on experiences. “It used to be that the focus was all on the galleries — and that’s still a huge part of what we do — but so much of our work now is in developing educational programs and digital content, so we’re finding we need things like more studio space,” Roberts says. “The mission doesn’t stop within the walls.”
To that end, Roberts wants to remind folks that while the building is not open, the museum is still hard at work. “Our education staff is as busy as they’ve ever been!” he says, nodding to efforts to work on a video series in advance of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States of America next year, as well as ongoing workshops, lectures and acquisition of new material.
“This project has been years in the making. We want to modernize the building for today — and future-proof it for tomorrow,” says Roberts.
This article originally appeared in the October 2025 issue of WALTER magazine.
