Doors Open invites guests to explore new places, neighborhoods this weekend

It’s a chance to explore Milwaukee and get access to places and spaces you may have never seen before. This is an invitation inside more than 100 buildings around the city.

It’s called: Doors Open.

The two-day, mostly free event celebrates Milwaukee’s art, architecture, culture and history through individual, self-guided and public tours.

“What makes Doors Open Milwaukee unique compared to other cities is that we have a heavy neighborhood focus, so it’s not just talking about buildings and architecture,” Historic Milwaukee Events Director Grace Fuhr said.

You don’t need a ticket for the free tours. The buildings and sites are throughout the city.

You can create your own schedules and can start where you like.

Participating locations include places like Arts @ Large, America’s Black Holocaust Museum, the Milwaukee Athletic Club and Sanger House. The Milwaukee Artist Resource Network (MARN), an art and culture hub in the Third Ward, is also on the list.

“We felt that it was important for people who may not otherwise get a chance to come in to our location to be welcomed, to be walked in and to see exactly what we are creating here,” MARN President and CEO Mal Montoya said. “Our invitation is to have a very open and inviting location where anybody who walks through those doors feels not only at home, but that they can contribute, that they can be part of it, that they can own it.”

Doors Open is in its 12th year. Fuhr said they work with neighborhood associations and local business owners to encourage people to explore outside of their own communities.

“Alice’s Garden Urban Farm is a great example of a really amazing neighborhood spot to visit in the Lindsay Heights community,” she explained. “(Doors Open) offers the invitation to people who might not live in the neighborhood to go there, but it’s also an invitation for people in Black Milwaukee or Latinx Milwaukee to visit communities where they haven’t felt welcomed in the past.”

Doors Open also includes ticketed tours, performances, neighborhood events and mobile app tours.

“It’s making Milwaukee, as a whole, a welcoming and inviting place, and being able to share the stories of the community members who are doing really incredible work in our communities,” Fuhr said.

Doors Open runs Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 24 and 25.

Check online for open times for each building or business.

To find the list of free sites, click here.

To learn more about ticketed tours, click here.

Radio Milwaukee is also on the Doors Open list this year so, of course, we’d love to have you stop by our location this weekend for a tour.

Here are some other HYFIN-suggested locations:

• 617 Dance Space
• Alice’s Garden Urban Farm
• America’s Black Holocaust Museum
• Community Within The Corridor
• Wisconsin Black Historical Society
• Arts @ Large
• Jazz Gallery Center for the Arts
• MARN Art + Culture Hub 
• Milwaukee Athletic Club
• Sanger House
• The Button House