The National Children's Museum is a 150,000-sq.-foot (13,000-m²) interactive museum

Museum

A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...

 for children that is planned to open in 2013 in Prince George's County, Maryland

Prince George's County, Maryland

Prince George's County is a county located in the U.S. state of Maryland, immediately north, east, and south of Washington, DC. As of 2010, it has a population of 863,420 and is the wealthiest African-American majority county in the nation....

, as part of National Harbor

National Harbor, Maryland

National Harbor is a multi-use waterfront development on the shores of the Potomac River in Prince George's County, Maryland just south of Washington, D.C. near the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. It is being built by the Peterson Companies. The project is expected to cost over $2 billion...

. Its previous facility at H Street

H Street (Washington, D.C.)

H Street is an east-west street in Washington, D.C.. It is also used as an alternate name for the Near Northeast neighborhood, as H Street is the neighborhood's main commercial strip.-History:...

 NE, Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

, called the Capital Children's Museum, closed in August 2004.

Planning for the National Children's Museum began in 1999, when the Capital Children's Museum Board of Trustees identified the need for a new national institution for children in the Washington region. Congress designated CCM as the National Children's Museum in 2003.

The National Children's Museum is projected to attract 600,000 visitors in its first year of operation, 75 percent of whom will be from the Washington area. Tourists are expected to make up the remaining 25 percent.