Envisioning Yale’s New Home for Natural History
Summer 2024 update: We’ve added new post-renovation photos! Now you can compare some of our iconic spaces from before our renovation, during, and after re-opening. What a journey it has been! We’d like to thank you for following our blog during the years and encourage you to check out our read & watch page and …
The third floor of the new Peabody is soon to be home to our new Living Lab—the reimagined version of our former and beloved Discovery Room. This vibrant, interactive space will contain several live animal displays plus a cornucopia of assorted objects from across our collections, arranged in exciting cabinets and exhibits like the ones …
For the first time, the Peabody Museum will be displaying live plants in our public galleries. Many of the species featured in this island exhibit, including the thick-trunked cycad in the middle, are largely unchanged since the days of the dinosaurs. These plants were generously contributed to the Peabody’s new Central Gallery by our friends …
This month, we’ve ramped up our installation efforts. A few galleries are already starting to take their final shape as exhibition panels and objects begin to fill the new casework. Here you’ll see signs of progress in our Mesoamerica and Andes, Egypt and Mesopotamia, and History of Science and Technology galleries. Expert hands and modern …
We’ve given our Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus) specimen a new look for our reopening next year. We reinstalled this well known Pleistocene mammal in a pose that brings its massive antlers, spanning nearly ten feet across, down to eye level. This charging posture will allow visitors to appreciate both the scale of its most recognizable feature and the …
The Otisville Mastodon (Mammut americanus) has returned to the Peabody after more than three years in Canada being cleaned, prepared, and remounted by the team at Research Casting International. Roughly 11,000 years old and over ten feet tall, it was unearthed on a farm near Otisville, New York, in 1872. It likely encountered some of …
The steel frame for Brontosaurus has been installed in the Burke Hall of Dinosaurs and adorned with the sauropod’s massive pelvis, leg bones, and dorsal vertebrae. Each individual fossil is supported by its own, independent armature and can be removed for study. One femur alone weighs nearly 600 pounds and the hips are so enormous …
Tylosaurus was one of the largest genera of mosasaur in history. The specimen now displayed in the Peabody’s new Central Gallery once swam and hunted in Late Cretaceous seas over what is now Texas. Its fossilized remains were preserved for millions of years before being meticulously extracted and prepared for exhibition. This fossil mount, a …
The Peabody’s new Central Gallery, beautifully designed by Centerbrook Architects & Planners, is now home to two of the museum’s signature fossil mounts. The “Skeleton Crew” from Research Casting International delivered and installed Archelon and Tylosaurus in just under a week. Suspended from the beamed ceiling and bathed in natural light, one of the largest …
A construction project of this scale has so many individual tasks and components that progress can seem slow. During the past month, however, the renovation has accelerated dramatically and corners of the new Peabody are taking shape. Classrooms, offices, and exhibition spaces are now equipped with fresh paint, modern lighting, finished flooring, and glass panels. …
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