'It's exciting to see it come together': An inside look at the progress of the Milwaukee Public Museum's future building

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- It has been two years since crews first broke ground on the future site of the Nature & Culture Museum of Wisconsin.

The construction site on 6th and McKinley will be the future home of the Milwaukee Public Museum, which is set to close its doors at its current space next January.

"It's exciting to see it come together," said Dr. Ellen Censky, president of the Milwaukee Public Museum. 

The new building is inching closer to completion, with the 670 exterior concrete panels now installed, closing off the building, and allowing interior work to ramp up.

 "It's a beehive of activity, well-coordinated activity inside here," said Kurt Theune, Vice President of Mortenson Construction, the project builders. "Just to get ready for the exhibits, and the move, and all the things the museum has been waiting so long to do." 

CBS 58's Jenna Wells joined a media tour on Thursday, May 14, to see the progress on some of the highlights inside the new building.

They first saw the vestibule area, named the Milwaukee Museum Center. 

Next, the group travelled to the third floor to see the bones of what will become a 3-story display case.

The case will house large objects that are museum favorites, that don't fit into certain exhibit themes in the new building. That includes one of the mastodons, the copper doors from the European Village, and Sampson the Gorilla.

"It'll probably be permanently on display in these, because they're big things that we can't really move," Censky explained.

Each floor has built-out reflection lounges by large outside-facing windows, allowing visitors to step away from the busy exhibit halls.

On the fourth floor, there will be large viewing windows into the museum's collections and research labs, intending to give visitors a behind-the-scenes experience.

"One of our goals with this museum was to turn the museum inside out," Censky explained. What we meant by that was to make our research and collections more accessible to the public."

The fifth floor will house the Butterfly Vivarium, with a chamber for the butterflies to develop, and 16-foot-tall ceilings for them to fly.

The entire room is wrapped with windows facing the Milwaukee skyline.

"We've got a butterfly vivarium right now, which is amazing, but this one, it's a whole new atmosphere," Censky gushed.

Next to the Butterfly Vivarium, visitors can walk outside to the museum's rooftop terrace.

The rooftop will be rich with native plants and seating, and will be available to the public, and to rent as a private event space.

Throughout the building, 14 HVAC units are installed to ensure conditions are perfectly controlled for the collections and exhibits.

"Our collections have been stored improperly for so long in a building that's deteriorating," Censky said, reiterating that as a primary reason for the move to the new space.

Hundreds of craftworkers are behind the new building's innovation.

"We're standing on the coolest thing for me, which is the concrete, and the geometry, and how the structure itself has got so much uniqueness to it," Theune said.

It's all the foundation of a new chapter for the Milwaukee Public Museum, on track for next spring.

"What I'm hoping when people come into the museum is that they are excited, and also feel familiarity," said Censky.

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