Whatcom Museum facts for kids
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| Location | Bellingham, Washington |
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| Type | Art museum, History museum |
| Accreditation | American Alliance of Museums |
| Architect | Olson Kundig Architects, Lightcatcher Building |
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Old City Hall
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| Location | Bellingham, Washington |
| Built | 1892 |
| Architect | Alfred Lee |
| Architectural style | Late Victorian |
| NRHP reference No. | 70000648 |
| Added to NRHP | April 03, 1970 |
The Whatcom Museum is a fun place in Bellingham, Washington. It's a museum where you can explore both natural history and art. The museum has three main buildings: Old City Hall, the Lightcatcher building, and the Syre Education Center. It's even approved by the American Alliance of Museums, showing it's a top-notch museum!
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Discover the Whatcom Museum
The Whatcom Museum started as a non-profit group in 1982. It's managed by the City of Bellingham and the Whatcom Museum Foundation. This means the city and a special group work together to keep the museum running.
The museum has three main buildings for you to explore:
- Old City Hall
- Syre Education Center
- The Lightcatcher building, which has the Family Interactive Gallery (FIG) inside.
Amazing Architecture
The Old City Hall building is really old and special. It was built way back in 1892 for the town of New Whatcom. A local architect named Alfred Lee designed it. He used red brick and strong Chuckanut sandstone to build it.
The building's design was almost exactly like another old courthouse in Michigan. When it was first built, Old City Hall sat high up on a bluff overlooking Bellingham Bay. Over time, more land was added to the waterfront. Now, the building is above Maritime Heritage Park.
This building was used as the city hall until 1936. Then, in 1941, it became part of the museum. A fire damaged the building in 1962, but people in the community raised money to fix it.
The Lightcatcher Building
In 2009, the Whatcom Museum opened a new part in the Lightcatcher building. This building was designed by Olson Kundig Architects from Seattle. It's called the Lightcatcher because it has a huge, see-through wall. This wall is 37 feet tall and 180 feet long! It helps the building save energy by letting in lots of natural light.
What You Can See: Museum Collections
The Whatcom Museum has a huge collection of over 30,000 items! These items help tell stories about nature, history, and art.
One very important part of the collection is more than 4,000 items from the archives of two famous photographers: Darius Kinsey and Tabitha Kinsey. They took many pictures of the Pacific Northwest.
