On a crisp Saturday morning with a cry for adventure, young people climb, slide, spin, jump, explore and read in a former tin can factory in North Kansas City, Missouri. The sound echoed.
Yes, reading.
If you think this is a quiet activity, you haven't spent any time in a first grade classroom. And if you think all the indoor spaces young people visit are sticky, smelly, depressing hellholes, check your assumptions at the unmarked entrance.
Welcome to the rabbit hole. This is a brand new museum of children's literature, ten years in the making, founded by the only people with the stamina to accomplish such a feat: a former bookseller. Pete Cowdin and Deb Pettid are long-married artists who share Little Red Hen's bullish determination. They transformed huge old buildings into a series of settings taken directly from the pages of beloved children's books.
Before we explain what a rabbit hole is, here's what a rabbit hole is not. It's a place with touch screens, ball pits, cryptic plaques, velvet ropes, a cacophonous soundtrack, or costumed adults. It doesn't smell like graham cracker or apple juice (yet). At $16 per person for ages 2 and up, it's not cheap at all.
During its opening weekend, March 16, the museum was a haven for visitors of all ages, from newborns to veterans, and people with freckles and gaping teeth. Shouts of “Look up!” and “There is a path forward!” and “Here's a good dog, Carl!'' causing a merry havoc. For every child that rushed into the 30,000 square foot space, there was an adult eager to document the moment.
Have you ever had to make a shoebox diorama about your favorite book? If so, check out our classmates who created a move-in ready mini-kingdom complete with gingham curtains, clothespins, and actual spaghetti. You may remember.
Cowdin, Pettid and their team are those students, and they're all thriving.
The main floor of Rabbit Hole consists of 40 book-themed dioramas enlarged to life-size and arranged IKEA showroom style in a space the size of two hockey rinks. Inspired by John Steptoe's Uptown, it features pressed tin ceilings, faux stained glass windows and a jukebox. In the wonderful green room of “Goodnight Moon,'' you can pick up an old-fashioned telephone and hear the illustrator's son reading the story.
One fictional world blends into the next, allowing characters to stand shoulder to shoulder in the real world just as they stand shoulder to shoulder on the shelf. Visitors could slide down a pole in “The Fire Cat,” slide into a boa constrictor's gullet in “Where the Sidewalk Ends,” and relax in a fake bubble bath in “Harry the Dirty Dog.” There are plenty of familiar faces, including Madeline, Strega Nona, and Babar, but you'll also find a lot of familiar faces in “Crow Boy,'' “Sam and the Tigers,'' “Gladiola Garden,'' and “The Bajaba Jungle.''
First grade teacher Emma Miller said: “Many of these books are the ones I use in my classroom. They are so immersive and beautiful. I was blown away.”
Taylor Brown said as her young child ran toward “Frog and Toad.” “We love the opportunity to let Mason explore different senses. He has autism, so this is the perfect place for him to find his little hidey-hole.”
At “Caps for Sale,” a group of boys leaned on beanbags and handed out copies of the book. The identical twins called out “Bread and jam for Frances” on the pink rug in Badger's house. On his second visit, the 3-year-old listened to his grandfather read “The Tawny Thin Lion.''
“I've been to some of these indoor places and it's like a jungle gym,” said Tommy Tran, a father of three from Oklahoma. You go to the area, pick up the book, and actually start reading as if you were in the story.”
All of the books scattered throughout the museum are available for purchase at Lucky Rabbit, a bookstore located around a cozy amphitheater. Pettid and Cowdin estimate that for every visitor, he sells one book, with about 650 visitors per day following the Pink Rabbit's footsteps from the parking lot.
At one time, Cowdin and Pettid owned Reading Reptile, a Kansas City institution known for its children's books as well as its literary establishment. When Dave Pilkey came to town, Pettid and Cowdin welcomed him by making him a 3.5-foot papier-mâché Captain Underpants. Young customers joined in to make the Tooth Gnasher Superflash and the “In the Night Kitchen” bread plane.
One of the store's biggest fans, Meg McMath, continued to frequent the store long after the products (and the chairs) were outgrown, all the way through her college years. McMath, now 36, traveled from Austin, Texas, with her husband and her 6-month-old son to see Rabbit Hole. “She even cried a few times,” she said.
Reading Reptile has weathered Barnes & Noble superstores and Amazon. Then the “Harry Potter effect” happened, and “suddenly adults wanted their children to move from picture books to thick books,” Pettid said. They skipped from here to there. They had a lot of things missing. ”
Story time became a field for further experimentation as parents were swayed by the reading lists of their “gifted” children.
“It completely transformed the reading experience,” Cowdin says. Not to mention the plight of those who secretly take photos of books at any bookstore, later turning to online shopping.
In 2016, Cowdin and Pettid shut down Reptile to focus on Rabbit Hole, an idea they had been percolating for years. They hope this will be a way to spread the organic bookworm spirit she instilled in her five children for readers who struggle to find characters similar to themselves. It was. The museum was supposed to celebrate classics, forgotten gems, and quality newcomers. How difficult would it be?
Caudin and Pettid had no experience in the nonprofit world. They knew nothing about fundraising or construction. They are ideas people, half-glass types, idealists, but also stubborn visionaries. They didn't want to hand over their “dream” (the word they put in quotation marks) to a consultant who knew little about children's books. During the process, the officer resigned. Their children have grown up. Covid has arrived. They had to live elsewhere for a year because a tree fell on their house. “I literally told Pete 20 times that I was quitting,” Pettid said.
“It wasn't always fun,” Cowdin said. “But we were like, 'Okay, let's do this and let's figure out a way to do it.' And we just kept thinking about it.”
Little by little, like “The Little Engine That Could,” they raised $15 million and gathered executives who embraced their vision and commitment to Kansas City. They made a book wish list. All genders. All publishers,” said Pettid, who has met with the rights department and author estate office to obtain permission. Most people accepted it. Some people didn't. (We currently have rights to over 70 titles.)
“A lot of people think children's bookstores are really cute,” Pettid said. “They don't really care about children's culture. That's why we had to buy this building.”
They purchased the factory from Robert Riccardi for $2 million. Robert Riccardi was an architect and his family ran a beverage business there for 20 years. His company, MultiStudio, worked with Cowdin and Pettid to reimagine the space, which is located in a corner of an industrial area surrounded by views of railroad tracks, highways, and the skyline.
Cowdin and Pettid began experimenting with layouts. Ultimately, they employed a staff of 39 people, including 21 full-time artists and makers, and created everything in the museum from a combination of steel, wood, foam, concrete, and papier mache. did.
“My parents are the movers and shakers,” Gloria Cowdin said. She is the middle of five children and was named after Badger's sister Frances. Yes, that's her voice reading out in the exhibit. “No matter how crazy it was, there was never a time when what they wanted to accomplish didn’t happen.”
When I toured it in December, it was hard to imagine how this semi-constructed area would be integrated into a museum. The 22,000 square foot manufacturing section was filled with drills and saws. The whiteboard showed an assembly diagram and a list of punches. (Under “Random Tasks,” someone had written a note that read, “Write a Christmas song.”) The entrance and the level below, known as a cave or burrow, was a dense zone of scaffolding and machinery.
But there were also some calm parts. Undeterred by the commotion, Kelly Harrod worked on a fresco of trees outside her Blueberry for Sal kitchen. In her two years as lead painter, she has witnessed steady growth of her Rabbit Hole.
“I remember painting Perez and Martina’s house before the insulation was put in,” Harrod said. “I put on a hat, gloves and coat and tried to keep my hands from shaking.”
Lee Rosser was similarly frustrated when he talked about his biggest challenge as a design and manufacturing manager. Problem: How to make the dragon and cloud fly up the grand staircase in “My Father's Dragon”. Solution: “It's very simple conceptually” – it didn't sound simple – “but we're dealing with thousands of pounds of weight, piled high. I make up things that aren’t being told, or at least that I’m not aware of.”
The attention to detail extends to the exhibits that cover the floor. Blueberries for Monkey's tool drawer contains Pete Cowdin's mother's egg beater and a jar containing Cowdin and Pettid's eldest daughter Sally's baby teeth. This tooth is a wink to Robert McCloskey's earlier book, “The Main Premolars.” Or were they molars? Where dental records were available, Cowdin and Pettid consulted them to ensure accuracy.
“For Pete and Deb, it's about trying to imagine what they see in their minds,” said Brian Selznick, a longtime friend who helped stock Lucky Rabbit's shelves. He is the author of many books, including “The Invention of Hugo Cabret.”
Three months ago, the cave looked like a desert rock formation studded with pink chicle. The den of the museum's eponymous fox-rabbit mascot was pitch black except for the sparks flying from the soldering iron. The floor was covered in small metal letters reclaimed from a newly renovated donor wall at a local museum.
Caudin and Pettid proudly described the work in progress. These were part of the museum that blossomed from seed in their imagination. But to the naked eye, they were as inviting as bulkhead doors leading into a terrifying basement.
Once the museum opened to the public, the caves and burrows suddenly made sense. The Pink Chiclets are books, over 3000 of which are molded in silicone, cast in resin, and incorporated into walls, stairs, and floors. Thickness varies from 1.5 inches to 3 inches. As visitors descend down the rabbit hole, they can trace their fingers along the edges of the petrified volume. They can climb rock formations, including layers of books. Or you can curl up and read a book.
Dennis Butt, another longtime Rabbit Hole employee, combined 92 donated books, including his own copies of “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings.” he said: “They're a little part of me.”
As for the metal letters, they are pressed into the walls of a blue-lit tunnel that ascends the ramp to the first floor. They spelled the first lines of 141 books, including “Charlotte's Web,'' “The Devil in the Drain,'' and “Martha Speaks.'' Some were easier to decipher than others, but one line stuck out: “Mashed potatoes are meant to have enough for everyone.” It reminded me of another sentence from Ruth Krauss's first definition book, “A Thing for Digging'' (illustrated by a young Maurice Sendak).
At Rabbit Hole, books are something to stand on. They are the bedrock, the foundation. They are solid ground.
Cowdin and Pettid plan to expand to three more floors and add exhibition space, a print shop, story lab, resource library and Discovery Gallery. An Automat-style cafeteria and a George and Martha-themed party and craft room will be opening soon. A rooftop bar is also under construction.
Of course, life at an art museum is not always happy. Some visitors whined and cried especially when approaching the exit. One of the exhausted adults said, “Charlie, we've done everything.”
Then, “Charlie, it's time to leave.”
And finally, “Okay, Charlie, I'll leave it here.” A clue to the hysteria.
But the moral of the story, and the point of the museum, and perhaps the point of the reading, depending on who you share the book with, crystallized in a quiet moment in the grand dressing room. The boy, wearing a Chiefs Super Bowl T-shirt, pretended to be asleep under a fleece blanket. he said before closing his eyes. “Goodnight, Grandma. I love you to the moon.”