National Public Housing Museum filled with resident stories, artifacts

To visit the National Public Housing Museum is to step back in time, era by era.

Open the door to one room, you’re transported to the Turovitz family’s late-1930s apartment in Chicago's Jane Addams Homes development. You’ll view old photos and vintage furniture, and explore their kosher kitchen, complete with a treasured gefilte fish chopping bowl.

Open another door, and you’re standing in the Hatch family’s apartment from that same complex, but now it’s the 1960s. You’ll see Ebony and Jet magazines on the table, an enormous, antique color TV on the floor, and a beloved, light-up Jesus portrait on the wall.

Both spaces are enhanced with audio commentary from family members, including narration from Chicago actor Lil Rel Howery, whose relatives lived in the latter apartment.

These are two of the recreated, historic apartments featured in the museum, itself now housed in the only remaining building of the Jane Addams Homes at 919 S. Ada St. on Chicago's Near West Side. Opening April 4 and hosting a weekend of events, the institution explores the history of public housing in the U.S., and advocates for housing as a human right. But the experiences of residents — shared through artifacts and oral histories — are the true heart of the space.

The museum's Executive Director, Lisa Yun Lee, said she hopes to challenge visitors’ perceptions of what a history museum can be.

“We're also a radically beautiful art museum,” she said. “We're also a place to engage young people and families. And there's a lot of collective joy and wonder in this space, which I think people aren't necessarily expecting when they go to a public housing museum."

The museum was incorporated in 2007, but experienced numerous starts and stops as it worked to raise money and acquire its permanent home from the Chicago Housing Authority. The museum originally operated, for several years, out of 625 N. Kingsbury St. in River North.

The museum's permanent location can now focus on allowing residents to preserve their history following the demolition of thousands of public housing units across the country. Staff members say they wanted to convey to visitors the complexity of public housing, rather than perpetuate the common narrative that paints it as a failure.

“I want them to understand that the history of public housing is something capacious,” Lee said. “It's something that speaks to all of us. And I want people to see themselves in this museum.”

Many will relate to the wealth of exhibitions and installations that focus on everyday life. For example, “History Lessons” features household items from people who lived in public housing, including Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Sonia Sotomayor and the late George Floyd’s sister, Latonya. “Feeling At Home” displays replicas of couch cushions owned by residents, including legendary rapper Roxanne Shanté, who once lived in the Queensbridge Houses complex in New York City.

The museum offers plenty of visual art, including murals, as well as posters that advertised public housing developments following President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. The “Still Here” exhibition uses art to address the removal of indigenous peoples, and their solidarity with displaced Black communities. In the courtyard, “Animal Court” features restored sculptures Edgar Miller created in the 1930s for the Jane Addams Homes.

A standout exhibition is the REC Room, co-curated by DJ Spinderella. Visitors can play vinyl records from a variety of famous musicians who grew up in public housing, and view visual presentations about their lives and careers.

“It’s just an example of confronting the stereotypes of who lived here, and that it was all doom and gloom,” said museum co-founder and board chair Sunny Fischer.

Museum board member Francine Washington also referenced the happy times she had living in the now-demolished Stateway Gardens in Bronzeville. She recalled memories of playing marbles, jumping rope, swimming and ice skating with neighbors.

“I miss it,” said Washington, who is 69. “It was a family. It was really a village. I never said I lived in the projects. I lived in the community of the Chicago Housing Authority.”

But the museum doesn’t shy away from the low points in the history of public housing. During the tour of the recreated Jane Addams Homes, visitors will learn about discriminatory policies that impacted the lives of Black public housing residents. Topics such as redlining, racial covenants and blockbusting are explained in a powerful presentation created by Chicago performance collective Manual Cinema and Princeton University professor Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor.

While other institutions are responding to the current political climate by avoiding conversations about race, Lee said the National Public Housing Museum is committed to discussing social justice concerns. In fact, as an official Site of Conscience, the organization must connect the past to contemporary human rights issues, she said.

The museum inspires visitors to consider the future of affordable housing through its "Demand the Impossible Advocacy Space" and case studies exhibition examining a successful public housing project. The museum site itself also includes 15 mixed-income apartments.

Lee said the organization is cautious about diversifying its funding, given President Trump's threats to cut some financial support for museums and libraries. This month, he issued an executive order calling for the elimination of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The National Public Housing Museum has received funding from the IMLS over the years, including a $129,050 grant in 2024. It also was awarded a $500,000 capital grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and other federal funding for ongoing support of its community programs.

"We believe that the federal government should be responsible for helping to create the best civic, arts and cultural organizations," Lee said. "We hope that the federal government will see the value of this work."

For now, museum leadership is celebrating the accomplishment of opening the new building.

"We are feeling elated that our dream came true," Fischer said.