The Brooklyn Children’s Museum is heading into the new year with a new president.
The nation’s oldest kid’s museum named Stephanie Wilchfort its new head in mid-December. Wilchfort grew up in Brooklyn and visited the Crown Heights institution growing up, she said.
“This really is a dream job,” Wilchfort said. “Throughout my childhood and the childhoods of so many kids growing up in Brooklyn, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum has been an inspiration.”
Wilchfort comes to the job from the Tenement Museum on the distant island of Manhattan, where she served as vice president of development and oversaw a $20-million capital improvement campaign. That experience will come in handy as the Children’s Museum prepares to open a new rooftop pavilion in the coming year, and an annex in Dumbo in 2016.
“The museum is constantly finding new ways to excite the imaginations of our kids – both in the neighborhood and beyond,” Wilchfort said. “So much is in store for the museum over the next few years.”
The pavilion’s opening will mark the completion of a major, long-term expansion, which also included the opening of a new building in 2008.
Wilchfort will take the helm early next year. She replaces Mindy Duitz, who led the museum from 1984 to 1994, then returned last year to serve as interim president.
