Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

This place is forever undergoing renovations, but this latest one seems to have hit all the right notes. (The witty banners announcing the redo – «Like many on Fifth Avenue, I’m having a little work done” – affectionately skewered its Upper East Side neighbors.) I can honestly say that this is one of coolest and most engaging outposts on Museum Mile. It’s not the Met (and it’s not supposed to be), but you can easily spend half a day exploring here.
The mansion (the former home of Andrew Carnegie) is remarkable in itself. Fun facts that I recall from a long-​ago tour: The church across the street has no steeple because Mrs. Carnegie didn’t want a shadow on her garden; the doorway to Mr. Carnegie’s office is unusually low because the industrialist enjoyed watching powerful visitors bow in order to enter; and the couple had the house designed with an early version of air conditioning.
Fast forward to the present: The permanent collection is wide-​ranging, but the special exhibits are really their bread and butter. Chairs, posters, textiles – you name it, they’ll get you right into the nitty-​gritty of how design works. And it’s hands-​on. Upon entry, you’re given a device («the pen») that can capture images and info from anything on display, which you access online after your visit. The other end of the pen can be used to design and manipulate images from the collection. This is tremendous fun once you get the hang of it, and passing staff members cheerfully offer to help if you look confused. Similarly, there’s an «Immersion Room» in which visitors see their designs projected on the walls in real time.
The redesigned garden is now open to the public after many years of locking everyone out; also improved are the attitudes of the guards, who were once notorious for being the meanest in the neighborhood. The café is cute, although the staff there seems to hate everyone. Skip it and head straight for the shop, which is entertaining (and free if you don’t have time for a whole museum visit).
Ticket prices are high ($ 18 for adults, but 18 and under are free); get your tickets online for a modest savings or come for free after 6pm on Saturdays. Admission is only $ 5 for the next two weeks because some galleries are closed, so if you’re on a budget, now is the time to go.

Came here with some friends to see the Pixar exhibit during the Pay-​What-​You-​Wish time period (Saturdays, 6−9pm). The whole experience was so much fun! From the start, the staff were all so friendly and welcoming, and the museum really lives up to its name. Set in the gorgeous former Carnegie mansion, the aesthetic of each exhibit is very beautiful and well conceptualized. The interactive pens encouraged us to be more engaged with the works, and the stylus/​program was incredible (I could have spent hours with it!). I can’t wait to go back.
Be sure you don’t miss the chairs on the basement level!

A year ago I discovered the newly renovated Cooper Hewitt Museum. After passing by it during the many months of work it took to accomplish the gut renovation I was happy to rediscover the collection and the gorgeous mansion. Not to mention the welcoming gardens and the quiet café.
If you like design and hands on experience, just go. It is a good place to see what design brings to our lives. You can also enjoy some unique experiences like the Immersion Room. Don’t hesitate to bring children because they will have fun too.
As for architecture lovers, it’s a must. The Mansion was Andrew Carnegie’s property and a landmark in Carnegie Hill. The garden is also quite unique in the neighborhood. I believe the garden, the café and the gift shop are accessible without museum admission, so you can come back later and enjoy the place.
I think it’s one of the best «boutique» museums in the City, combining design, architecture, gardens and a cosy café.

Cooper Hewitt is beautiful. I can’t describe it. There are several special exhibits well worth the visit. The mansion itself is fantastic. You have access to three floors all full of exhibits and displays.
I really loved the lower level. They have a display of the employees art work. You can’t miss it as you go to the café, and restroom, downstairs. The employees have created some great pieces. Very talented.
ABOUT ADMISSION COST: I screwed up on my first Unilocal tip! If you buy on-​line it is $ 16.00 for adults! The web site has the correct admission price, sorry. Tickets now cost $ 18.00 for adults, and Seniors are $ 12.00 when you buy at the door. You pay $ 16.00 if you buy on line and $ 10 for Seniors purchased on line!
I can’t wait until spring to sit in the garden. They have brand new benches. Free admission to the garden, café, and gift shop at all times. They even have a ping pong table in the garden.
The place was full of students of all ages today. It is such a big space it did not interfere with my picture taking. I took over 200 shots. So much to see! They do not mind photography just no flash or selfie sticks.
Seeing the Carnegie Mansion with all it’s ornate detail was my favorite part. Imagine their lifestyle. Chandeliers so beautiful. Wooden carved staircases and door frames. I imagined the craftsmanship that went into the building. It must have taken a lot of time to build.
I’m so glad this mansion is preserved. There were a lot of educational activities going on today. Great for school field trips.
I may return on-​pay-​as you wish Saturdays between 6pm and 9pm. Beautiful renovation! A must see!

What a fun, interesting place! The technology here is astounding — you are given digital pens to capture things you want to follow up on, and to design your own images on special tables all over the museum.
The collection was interesting and fun to wander through. A great place for two adults, as we were, but also fun for the kids!
Bonus for the beautiful garden right outside!

Great museum. I found the layout and space of the Cooper Hewitt to be easy to navigate.
We came to see the ‘Pixar: The Design of Story’ exhibit and it was informative, interactive, and well-​curated. They had a table in the middle for kids (or adults, for that matter) to draw their own characters, starting with a simple shape. There was a nice balance of both visual and audio information.
We started on the 3^rd floor and worked our way down to the Pixar exhibit on the first floor, but I found just about everything we saw to be of some interest.
I also thought it was particularly smart of this museum to hand out styluses to the public, of which you could document any part of the exhibit and save for revisiting online later.

Awesome. Can’t believe we’ve never been here before. Went because of the Pixar exhibit with original story art, concept, color hues, and animation examples & left with an immensely positive experience after not only seeing the very well done Pixar exhibit, but also How Posters Work (visual exploration of poster design/​concepts) and a hugely impressive PROVOCATIONS: THE ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN OF HEATHERWICK STUDIO exhibit on the upstairs floors. This was very well conceived, right down to the rolling bridge prototype (that actually works)

I can’t believe I haven’t written before about my experiences at Cooper Hewitt. The
latest addition is a magic ‘pen’ which allows you to tap the items you want to look
at away from the Museum, add them to your own ‘collection’ by way of a link
found on your admission ticket-​and WOW: You can preserve the experience for
posterity. Never seen anything like this before-​the kids were tapping away, which
I guess is ok: I of course have way too many posters saved, eutectic. BUT it
is great. Also the gift store has many many fine and wonderful items and the
eaterie I think makes their own food: all of the items looked very tasty and maybe
by now the garden is open. It is a WONDERFUL Museum: i saw the Sonia and Robert Delauney exhibit here two years ago: absolutely awesome! A Museum NOT to be missed.

The Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum (the institution’s most recent, and awkward, name) occupies the former Andrew Carnegie Mansion. It was founded in 1897 by the Hewitt sisters, granddaughters of Peter Cooper, and originally affiliated with the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art (the East Village college). It has been part of the Smithsonian since 1967. The Cooper Hewitt has two major challenges; one is the (residential) building it awkwardly occupies (and which only reopened after a supposedly major renovation in 2014) and the other is defining and presenting its extensive (and never fully seen) collections of materials from around the world, including books, paintings, works on paper, technology, and just about every sort of object imaginable (for example, the current installation includes a room of wall paper samples as well as the rear end of a London double-​decker bus!).
The house makes an awkward home for a museum. Now a landmark, much of its rich interior remains on the first two floors, and not infrequently clashes with installations (the bus, for example, is uncomfortably wedged into a grand carved stairwell), and while the most recent reconstruction added third floor exhibit space, it did not satisfactorily resolve these fundamental tensions nor create a comfortable circulation route for visitors. The other tension revolves around mission. The Cooper Hewitt has a mish-​mash of installations which provide little historical context for the development of design. Although over the decades it has hosted well executed and received special exhibitions on many topics (for example, Piranesi as designer or the work of Sonia Delaney), it lacks a permanent display to serve as an introduction for those unfamiliar with major trends in design history. Its most recent reconfiguration relies heavily on computer technology, seemingly oblivious to the inevitable obsolescence such installations must experience, of which no one should be more aware than the curators of a design museum!
The Cooper Hewitt includes a gift shop and some food service; it also has an interactive area designed for younger visitors. Their popular garden lost yet another season as construction there is still ongoing. They do host a variety of ticketed educational programs. There are elevators, but the building can still be a challenge for anyone to navigate, and especially those with accessibility concerns.

This is a very nice museum for anyone interested in design. We ended up here by accident since the Guggenheim is closed on Thursdays, but it was a happy accident.
One of the nice things about this museum is that it makes great use of technology. Every visitor is given a small wand – one end can be used to «write» on interactive stations and the other end permits visitors to «save» the things they like to their digital account, which can be accessed from home. Unlike many tech features at other museums, this one worked perfectly as advertised.
The museum isn’t huge, but it is quite interesting and diverse, covering everything from advertising to posters to textiles to architecture and more. (The exhibits change, so you may see different things.) We spent about 90 minutes there, but we could have spent longer if we’d taken a little more time to let some of the knowledge and information sink in and interact with more of the interactive stations.
I wish it were a little larger, but I felt the price was right for an interesting and educational museum of this sort.

Really amazing exhibits! Definitely find a listing of what each floor holds before you go exploring. As it’s an eclectic kind of museum, your opinions may drastically differ from room to room!
Overall, a really solid experience, with cool graphic design explorations, a 3D extrusion/​printing exhibit, and a masterful experimental architecture gallery.
I’d advise setting aside at least 2 hours for this one. But if you like to dig in and really enjoy each exhibit, stay for an afternoon. Definitely worth the sticker price.

One of a kind museum. This is where you can interact with art and design, not just walking and reading labels. If you are into new technology, new design, or architecture, or you just want to go to a museum where not everything is about paintings and sculptures, you should definitely come here. It is unexpectedly fun.

$ 18 for a handful of dark and dusty galleries. The store is better than the museum exhibits.
High ratio of security guards to the value of the exhibit artifacts makes no sense to me. Most guards were fine, but one security guy stood partially blocking entrance to a side gallery and didn’t budge an inch when I slid past him sideways. Then a while later when I was talking with my daughter about an exhibit, he decides that we need to move for him to pass by rather than him taking any number of routes around us through the nearly empty space.

Interesting museum in historic mansion – well worth a visit.

Pretty pricey, and it’s rather small. Probably better to go after 6 when it’s «Pay as you Wish» instead of the $ 20+. It’s a few floors, and you can see everything within an hour. Doing activities is a bit difficult since some of the stuff is out of order or a group is hogging it. Would be nice if it was bigger with more touch options. Compared to others on museum mile, it would be second after the Met.

Cooper Hewitt is definitely my favorite museum in NYC. Not only are their exhibits well curated and interesting, but I always leave thinking about the world in a different way. They have a perfect juxtaposition between art and design. The curators do a great job showing the progression of the design of some everyday object or showing how many different cultures present the same thing.
Gift shop could have some more smaller, cheaper trinkets.
If you have a Smithsonian membership, Washingtonians, you can use it here!

Gnarly new museum about product design with interactive elements. Actually, guests were supposed to get pens that helps them interact with certain exhibits but they weren’t available on the day I went.
You will see products from multiple eras and even the first Iphone. But then there will be items that the Hewitt sisters collected over the years as well and other items related to the house itself. The coolest exhibit is probably the thing with the tools that you will see many pictures of.
It costs something to get in here but it was worth it for being free.

The Cooper Hewitt just reopened and they have some great exhibits. They have a great exhibit on tools spanning from thousands of years ago to today.
Throughout the museum, there are touch screens for you to design buildings and other and other structures. This can definitely keep kids occupied as well.
One of my favorite exhibits were the 3D staircases — all very interesting and unique wooden 3D staircase models.
Definitely worth checking out if you have not been since the renovation.

It’s just like an adult touch museum. They encourage visitors to interact with certain displays, and in some cases to provide feedback. An excellent way to test design ideas.
Every Friday 6−9pm they have pay as you wish admission. It did get pretty crowded even on a rainy night. Else it’s about $ 15+ for admission which is pretty steep considering there are only 3 floors. There is no ma because there is no need for one. I tried to read all the descriptions and I was able to finish in under 2 hrs. The 3^rd floor with the flying tools is one of the most interesting installation I’ve seen. Good for photo op.
The small compound is quite beautiful, especially the gift shop/​café area during daylight so maybe I’ll come back again to enjoy that.

Wow — what a terrible disappointment!
Just visited the newly opened museum, which really makes me miss the former Cooper Hewitt, since it was so much better in every way!
The entire museum is a miss-​mash, random exhibition of unrelated objects. For example, you might see a new vase, next to an old shoe, next to an old tool, next to a new chandelier– with only the slimmest of connections. Boring, Boring!
Such poorly curated exhibitions makes it very difficult to learn anything new.
The museum also seems to be aimed at a pretty low educational level — it feels as if it is more of a junky children’s interactive museum than one for adults.
A waste of time and money.