Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum at the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile.
   It is one of 19 Smithsonian Institution museums and one of three Smithsonian facilities located in New York City, along with the National Museum of the American Indian's George Gustav Heye Center in Bowling Green and the Archives of American Art New York Research Center in the Flatiron District. Unlike other Smithsonian museums, Cooper Hewitt charges an admissions fee.
   It is the only museum in the United States devoted to historical and contemporary design. Its collections and exhibitions explore design aesthetic and creativity from throughout the United States' history.
   Early history In 1895, several granddaughters of the politician and businessman Peter Cooper, Sarah Cooper Hewitt, Eleanor Garnier Hewitt and Amy Hewitt Green, asked the Cooper Union college in New York City for space to create a Museum for the Arts of Decoration. The museum would take its inspiration from the Musee des Arts Decoratifs, Paris and would serve as a place for Cooper Union students and professional designers to study decorative arts collections.
   Cooper Union's trustees provided the fourth floor of the Foundation Building. It opened in 1897 as the Cooper Union Museum for the Arts of Decoration. The museum was free and open to the public thre
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