Hip-hop culture has been heavily influential for over 30 years and is being recognized by the opening of a museum in its birthplace of New York City. In 2017, Harlem and midtown Manhattan will welcome the Hip-Hop Hall Of Fame Museum, which will feature donated memorabilia from Run-DMC, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, Outkast, Salt-N-Pepa, Common, Afrika Bambaataa, Eminem and Young Jeezy, according to the New York Daily News.
“This will be the home of hip hop history,” said JT Thompson, who produced BET’s one-time Hip-Hop Hall of Fame Awards show, to the News. “People need to understand the importance of hip hop, the elements, the DJs, the B-boys and B-girls and the graffiti writers.”
The Harlem location on 125th street will be 12,000 square feet and have a coffee and juice bar along with shops and television studio. It will also enroll 50 children in a youth media program every year. The midtown location will be a much larger space, boasting 50,000 square feet and will take fans on 90-minute tours and offer an interactive exhibit for fans. It will also be close to New York City’s Times Square.
Out of the $80 million that is needed to open the museum, $50 million has been raised so far. An Indiegogo crowd-funding campaign has been started to raise $500,000 more.
Organizers are hoping to start the building process in the summer of 2015 so that the museum can be unveiled to the public in 2017.
This isn’t the first hip-hop museum though. The National Museum of Hip Hop is also in Manhattan on fifth avenue. The Universal Hip-Hop Museum in the south Bronx will also be launching in 2017.