With less than a month of construction remaining before its first public event, Tacoma’s new LeMay – America’s Car Museum is revealing its final shape.
But what is that shape, exactly?
As workers attach the last of the reflective aluminum cladding, the long, oblong building is drawing comparisons to an airplane fuselage, an upside-down battleship, a tin can with the label removed.
To many, it evokes an automobile part, though there’s been no consensus on which part.
“We get asked about that all the time,” said Scot Keller, the new museum’s chief marketing and communications officer. “Is it supposed to be a fender? A hood scoop?”
“The answer is, ‘No,’” Keller said. “It’s not meant to replicate a car shape, though you could certainly see that.”
If the shape represents anything, Keller said, it’s a reinvention of the concept of an automotive museum – a place not only for hard-core car enthusiasts but anyone interested in the broader historical and social aspects of America’s fascination with the automobile.
The first event scheduled at the museum, on Sept. 24, is called “Hard Hats and High Heels” and will celebrate the end of the construction phase. The event is a fundraiser, intended to fuel a $12 million “Race to the Finish” campaign to cover operations costs until people begin buying tickets.
The official grand opening of the museum to the general public won’t take place until early next summer. The intervening time, Keller said, will be taken up by interior finishing, preparing exhibits and readying automobiles.
When it opens, the 165,000-square-foot building, on 9 acres near the Tacoma Dome, will be the largest car museum in North America and, depending on how you measure them, the third-largest in the world.
The structure’s odd shape, chiefly the creation of Los Angeles architect Alan Grant, co-owner of the firm GrantPrice, is based in part on the logistics of moving automobiles. It’s four floors are connected by street-sized ramps, and glass exterior doors are wide enough to drive cars in from the outside.
With a project cost of $60 million, the museum’s backers know the facility’s appeal has to be broad. They’re basing income projections on 425,000 paid visitors a year, just slightly fewer than Seattle’s Museum of Flight.
On a recent walk-through tour, Keller explained how that’s meant to work. The museum’s success, he said, will depend on attracting local visitors – not just once, but over and over as exhibits change.
“What’s critical is the story,” Keller said. “Car enthusiasts represent only about 10 percent of the population. The challenge with a car museum is, ‘How do you make it appealing to a broader range of people?’”
“We want it to be a community building,” he said, “as opposed to somewhere you go once every two years when you have to do something with the relatives.”
Inside, the museum’s four floors will be divided into 15 galleries, displaying some 350 cars at any one time.
An example of changing gallery shows, Keller said, is one called, “The British Invasion.” It notes that the fascination with British music in America in the 1960s was accompanied by a fascination with British automobiles: MGs, Triumphs, Aston-Martins and Minis.
The display will be based on the cars, but set in a 1960s context, complete with music of the time.
“Instead of just saying, ‘Here’s 12 great British cars, and here’s everything you would ever want to know about them,’ we’ll show their broader relevance,” Keller said.
Another gallery will feature the electric car and the history and future of other methods of alternative propulsion, he said.
A third will feature motor sports, where visitors will walk through a gallery set up like a race track, with pit stops, race cars and Doppler sound effects of cars on the straightaway.
The museum will also have a small built-in theater, a cafe, store, a “kid zone,” driving simulators and a banquet room with seating for 225.
The north end of the ground floor will hold an open garage, where museum mechanics will restore and maintain vintage cars. People will be able to take classes in the garage, Keller said, on such subjects as automotive detailing.
Outside, 3.5 acres of former Tacoma Dome parking is being transformed into a grass show field and track for special car shows and, between shows, drive-in movies and concerts.
Another of the Dome’s parking lots will be rented from the city for test drives and “driving experiments,” Keller said.
Rob Carson: 253-597-8693
rob.carson@thenewstribune.com
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