The American Bible Society is building a $60 million exhibit along Independence Mall, intended to trace the connection between America’s founding and the Bible.
The Faith & Liberty Discovery Center will open at Fifth and Market streets in one of Philadelphia’s most historic neighborhoods, multiple reports said.
The Bible Society, which moved from New York to Philly in 2015, made the announcement Wednesday morning with Mayor Jim Kenney, who said that the exhibit will be “another great tourist attraction” at Independence Mall.
The 40,000-square-foot attraction will be housed on the first floor of the Wells Fargo Building.
Local Projects, a design firm best known for its work on the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, will head the project. A local firm, JacobsWyper Architects’ Saylor Gregg Studio, is also involved in the highly intereractive design.
Specific exhibits, displays and programs haven’t been announced yet, and the Bible Society could not be reached for a comment.
But at Wednesday’s event, Bible Society President Roy Peterson said by tracking the impact the Bible has had in America since colonial times, viewers will better “understand our country, its founding and how people were inspired by the Bible,” he told the Philadelphia Business Journal.
The center will be among impressive neighbors:the National Constitution Center, IndependenceHall, the Philadelphia History Museum, theAmerican Philosophical SocietyMuseum, theNational Museum of American Jewish History and the Museum of the American Revolution.
