The Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks (The Wild Center) is a natural history

Natural history

Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...

 museum that opened July 4, 2006 in New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

 state's Adirondack Park. The museum and the exhibits were designed by The Office of Charles P. Reay with the St. Louis

St. Louis, Missouri

St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...

 architectural firm HOK

Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum

HOK is a global architecture, interiors, engineering, planning and consulting firm. HOK is the largest U.S.-based architecture-engineering firm and the "No. 1 role model for sustainable and high-performance design." HOK also is the second-largest interior design firm...

. The museum occupies a 31 acres (125,452.7 m²) site in the town of Tupper Lake, New York, the approximate geographic center of the six million acre (24,000 km²) Adirondack Park.

The museum mixes up the indoors and outdoors on a trail-filled campus. There is a waterfall and a towering glacial ice wall inside, and exhibit labels in the woods outside. The museum features live exhibits and live animals, including river otters, birds, amphibians and fish. Indoors, a marsh appears to flow into a real pond that laps at the outside of the building, and the calls of live owls and otters mix with the splashing cascade of a trout-filled indoor stream. High definition films in a wide-screen theater explore the region and showcase fascinating reports from field scientists researching everything from moose to loons to alpine summits.

This green museum

Green museum

A green museum is a museum that incorporates concepts of sustainability into its operations, programming, and facility. Many green museums, but not all, use their collections to produce exhibitions, events, classes, and other programming to educate the public about the natural environment...

 has earned LEED

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design consists of a suite of rating systems for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings, homes and neighborhoods....

 silver from the U.S. Green Building Council and is the first LEED certified museum in the State of New York.

External links

• The Wild Center/Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks
• Metacosm Design Labs, "Swamp Music" Exhibits Designer
• Inside this Museum, The Great Outdoors, Christian Science Monitor
• Adirondacks Under Glass, The New York Times
• Office of the Governor. State of New York. "Governor Celebrates Grand Opening of Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks."
• Where the Wild Things Are, Times Union, Albany, New York
• Montreal Gazette Article