The Akron Art Museum's 1899 Building Is Open Again. Here's How to Spend a Free Thursday There

"It's a great place to take a break from a stroll in the galleries and sit and relax and do something fun and creative," Akron Art Museum CEO Jon Fiume told Ideastream about the new space inside the museum's oldest building. The words "take a break" explain the whole $12.5 million project. The renovated 1899 Building opened on September 23. Its rooms are smaller and more hands-on than the big galleries most Akron residents remember, and the exhibitions run for a year or more. Admission is free on Thursdays, when the museum stays open until 9 p.m. Taken together, that makes it a place for a quick weeknight visit you can repeat, not an all-day outing you plan once a year.

A building that spent two decades backstage

The Italian Renaissance building on High Street opened in 1899 as Akron's main post office. It once had a tiled Pony Express mosaic, which is now in the city's collection. The museum moved in from the nearby Carnegie library building in 1981, and for the rest of the century the old post office was the entire museum. In 2007 the steel-and-glass addition designed by Coop Himmelb(l)au opened next door. After that, the older building mostly held storage and offices, with an occasional exhibit.

So for much of the past two decades, the most recognizable part of the museum was the part visitors walked past. Fiume told Ideastream that renovating it had been "in the plans, at least for the last probably 10 years." Construction started in July 2025. Perspectus Architecture was the architect and Summit Construction was the construction manager. The building now carries a new name: the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation Building.

The project added 2,152 square feet of gallery space and a 957-square-foot classroom. It also added new restrooms and a family care room, plus equipment for video and digital art. Staff offices moved to the third floor, which puts the museum's whole staff in one place for the first time in years. The museum's attendance goal shows what all of this is for. Fiume hopes to grow from about 30,000 visitors a year to 50,000. A 30,000-visitor museum can't reach 50,000 on tourists and field trips alone, so a lot of that growth has to come from people who already live nearby and come back.

Rooms sized for a short visit

You enter the old building through the lobby of the 2007 addition, and the first thing you reach is the J.M. Smucker Co. Idea Machine. It's a two-story space where visitors make things, try ideas out and work with art, not just look at it. Gina Thomas McGee, the museum's director of learning and engagement, said the name comes from a Sol LeWitt quote: "The idea becomes a machine that makes the art." The first installation is by CHIAOZZA, the studio of artists Adam Frezza and Terri Chiao.

Upstairs, the Tony and Susie Paparella Galleries have low ceilings and are showing "The Surrealist Impulse." The show has 30 works by Dada, Surrealist and Art Brut artists, including Salvador Dalí, Joan Miró, René Magritte, Paul Delvaux and Victor Brauner. Some pieces come from Akron's own collection and others are on loan from the Museum of Modern Art. "The works are a little bit more intimate," curator Wendy Earle told Ideastream. She added that the museum's earlier masterpieces "don't always get the right amount of attention."

The McDowell Family Galleries are a new black-box room. They hold "Shana Moulton: Meta/Physical Therapy," an installation of eight synchronized video projections built around Cynthia, the artist's semi-autobiographical alter ego. Ideastream described it as a mix of '90s kitsch with music by Radiohead and Sarah McLachlan.

All three of these spaces work well for a 30-minute visit, and the run dates leave plenty of time to come back:

The museum's calendar and its exhibition listing give July 24, 2028 as the Idea Machine's closing date, but the reopening page says July 4, 2028. Either way, the installation will be up for nearly two years. If you want to see the Kasten or Pixley Young shows, those close first, at the end of January. "A Growing Conversation: Artworks From Our Collection" is ongoing.

Why Thursday is the day to go

The museum is open noon to 5 p.m. on Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. On Thursday it's open noon to 9 p.m., and gallery admission is free. It's closed Monday and Tuesday. On other days, adults pay $15, seniors 65 and older pay $10, and students with ID pay $8. Children 17 and under are always free. University of Akron students, faculty and staff with a Zip Card get in free, and Ohio EBT cardholders pay $3 for up to four adults per card. Active-duty military and their families are free year-round.

For two adults, Thursday saves $30 a visit. It also gives you four extra evening hours, which is the only time most people who work daytime hours can stop in on a weekday. With galleries this size, a free hour after work is enough to see one show properly, and you can save the next one for another Thursday.

There are two places to park. The High and Market Deck is across the street, and the Museum Lot is behind the building. The Museum Lot runs through HONK Mobile, and the visitor page lists it at $6 a day. Members can get garage tickets validated at the front desk. If you come from South Broadway, you can walk through the Bud & Susie Rogers Garden to the entrance when the garden is open. The garden and the gift shop keep the same hours as the galleries.

What's on the calendar through early November

Several fall programs use the new space directly. Two of them are on a Wednesday and a Thursday, so they fit a weeknight routine:

• Mess Makers: Music Day, Wednesday, October 14, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Music-themed creation stations and a drumming class for the museum's youngest visitors. Registration is required.
• Member Evening: 1899 Tour, Thursday, October 15, 5 to 6 p.m. A members-only tour of the renovated building. It's free for members, space is limited, and registration is required.
• Free After School Studio: Surrealism & Collage, Thursday, October 22, 4 to 6 p.m. For ages 6 to 12, connected to the new Surrealist show. Registration is requested, and an adult has to stay in the building.
• A Conversation with Chakaia Booker, Wednesday, October 28, 6 to 7 p.m. Free, with registration requested.
• Free Family Day: Indigenous Voices, Sunday, November 8, noon to 3 p.m. Artmaking and activities with Indigenous community organizations.

After School Studio meets on the fourth Thursday of each month from September through May. That makes October 22 an easy evening to plan around: free studio time for kids from 4 to 6, then free galleries for everyone until 9.

The rest of downtown has a busy fall too. Downtown Akron Partnership's 5th Annual Downtown Akron Fall Fest is on Saturday, October 17, from 4 to 7 p.m. It includes trick-or-treating along Main Street, free crafts, a costume contest, DJ Vinnie G and spooky express train rides. On Saturday, November 7, the free Smells Like Snow Coffee Festival comes to Lock 3, 200 S. Main St., from noon to 6 p.m.

Before or after the galleries

Downtown Akron's coffee shops mostly close in the afternoon. That matters if you want to grab something on the way to an evening visit. Downtown Akron Partnership lists weekday hours of 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. for Ilić Café on South Main, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. for Evelyn's Coffee & Banh Mi at 200 S. Main, and 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. for Akron Coffee Roasters on North High.

Downtown Akron Partnership's listings show these places open on Thursday evenings within walking distance of High Street:

1. The Daily Pressed, 323 S. Main St., serves coffee by day and cocktails at night, reopening at 5 p.m. on weekdays.
2. Bar Phoenix & The Phoenix Room, 205 S. Main St., has a Thursday Latin Night listed from 3 p.m. to close.
3. Cilantro Thai & Sushi, 326 S. Main St., is listed for dinner from 5 to 9 p.m. on Thursdays.
4. The Lockview, 207 S. Main St., known for grilled cheese, is listed until 10 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday.
5. The Circle of 5ths, 45 E. Market St., is a cocktail bar with food, listed from 4 to 11 p.m. on Thursdays.
6. Akronym Brewing, 58 E. Market St., is listed from 3 to 10 p.m. on weekdays.
7. High St. Hop House, 20 N. High St., focuses on bourbon, cocktails and craft beer and is listed until midnight.
8. Luigi's, 105 N. Main St., the long-running Italian spot, is listed until midnight Monday through Thursday.
9. Jilly's Music Room, 111 N. Main St., has a full kitchen and Thursday service from 5 p.m. to close.

Most of these listings don't show when they were last updated, so check hours before you go. Two downtown projects aren't open yet, and as of this writing they're still listed as "coming soon." The Mercantile at 1 Cascade Plaza is a general store from Shane Wynn and Becca Gippin, with local makers' goods, produce, coffee and grab-and-go food. Crafty Steere is a market, bar and restaurant at 222 S. Main St. Once they open, the Cascade Plaza store will be a block from the museum and will be open earlier in the day than most of the bars on this list.

Christopher Wertz grew up in Akron, and the team at Wertz Group keeps close track of changes downtown like the reopened 1899 Building, because they affect what a weeknight near High Street looks like. If you're weighing how close you'd like to live to downtown Akron's museums, restaurants and Lock 3 events, schedule a consultation and we'll go over the options with you.