A new cultural center themed around the “American Dream Experience” is set to open this weekend in Washington, D.C.
The Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream is scheduled to open on Saturday, capping off over a decade of work on the roughly $500 million project.
The main attraction at the five-story museum, which boasts around 70,000 square feet of exhibits, will be the “American Dream Experience.” It comprises a collection of historic buildings that have been renovated over the past 12 years, including the restored 19th-century Riggs National Bank.
“The American Dream is the ideal that any person, regardless of background or where they start, should have the opportunity to pursue a life of meaning and fulfilment,” said museum founder Michael Milken in a press release.
The center stands just around the corner from the White House. According to Axios, Milken was known as the “junk bond king” on Wall Street in the 1980s and later served prison time for securities fraud. President Donald Trump pardoned him in 2020. Now, Milken’s museum will stand just around the corner from the White House, where Trump resides, marking a full-circle moment for the founder.
The center’s executive director, Rachel Goslins, told reporters Wednesday that the institute hopes to host all of the U.S. citizen naturalization ceremonies in D.C.
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“I think it’s a gift that we’re on Pennsylvania Avenue — 6 million people a year walk past our doors on a street that’s largely closed to the public,” said Goslins, the former director of the Smithsonian’s Arts and Industries Building.
“You can’t go into any of these buildings, and so to have a space on this street for all the people who come past our front door already primed to think about these large themes about what is America, and what is opportunity and where do we want this country to go, I think is an incredible opportunity and gift of this location.”
