Sort of a weird thread, but what do you all think are the best historical exhibit renovations? By this I mean taking a historical building or grottos and renovating them to make a state of the art exhibit. For example, as I have heard, African Journey at Lincoln Park, or, my personal favorites I have been to Elephant Trails - Smithsonian Zoo - Renovation of the Pachyderm House Big Cat Falls - Philadelphia Zoo - Renovation of the Carnivore House African Grasslands - Henry Doorly Zoo - Renovation of the old ungulate paddocks and elephant/rhino exhibits. Africa Rocks - San Diego Zoo - Renovation to the old Africa Rocks and Cat/Dog canyon Tiger Trail - Nashville Zoo - Renovation of old (but not outdated) Bengal tiger habitat I would really like to hear how other places have renovated their exhibits, it doesn't matter if you've been to the exhibit pre-reno. I haven't been to that many historical zoos, so I might be stretching this, but I'd especially like to know about some in Europe, as I'm sure the renovations there are more common and (hopefully) very well done.
My home zoo, Antwerp Zoo, is one of the oldest in the world. It's undergone a fair few renovations too, in recent years. Luckily for us, it also maintains an image database, so we can access pictures taken a century ago. Historische Beeldbank The site is in Dutch, though. The Great Ape House at Antwerp was built in 1958, and at first looked like this: Later on, the moats were filled and the entire complex became indoors. In 2017, the zoo added outdoor enclosures again. The indoor enclosures can be seen in the back. The old Rhinoceros House used to keep (and breed!) northern white rhinos, and in more recent times ostriches, lowland anoas, and Indian rhinos. Currently it is integrated into a large aviary, housing various African birds (vultures, starlings, hornbills, ...) and African buffaloes. The Rotunda aviary used to house various waders (I distinctly recall pied avocets there, but there probably were plenty of other species in it as well). Currently it consists of two parts: one housing African penguins The other housing a variety of European birds: avocets, ruffs, European turtle doves, hoopoes, ... The old Raptor Aviaries have been repaired and reused as Parrot aviaries, almost in the exact same configuration. Historical images were all sourced from the image database, modern-day images from this site. Sorry for the small sizes of the historical images, that's just the size they came in.
For me the transformation of the Bronx Zoo’s historic Lion House (pictured below in 1906) into Madagascar. The lion house originally held all the zoos big cats, yet over time lions, tigers, and snow leopards were moved out into their respective natural habitats. The house would then sit empty before it was transformed into Madagascar (housing 6 species of lemur, fossa, nile crocodiles and reptiles). As well the renovated building has a catering space. A picture during construction Notice the roof in the next 2 pictures The finished product Here is a link with more info on the renovation. https://www.architectmagazine.com/project-gallery/lion-house-reconstruction-at-the-bronx-zoo-327
So on some of your examples the area was fully bulldozed and a new exhibit build in its place. I wouldn’t necessarily count those as renovations, specifically looking at African Grasslands and African Rocks. They both did not keep little or any prior features except for some trees.
No need to apologize. Those are both amazing developments just definitely more redevelopment than renovation. Their are very few historic zoos in the United States though. The Bronx Zoo is the clearest example with its Reptile House, Elephant House, Mouse House, Lion House, Aquatic Bird House, and World of Birds all symbolizing different eras of architecture. Yet their are some other historic zoos like Cincinnati, Philly, and Lincoln Park among others. We have a lot of WPA era zoos from the 1930’s as well, such as Toledo, Buffalo & Prospect Park. Historic in a different way but still interesting. American zoos definitely lack in historic buildings compared to their European counterparts though. As even many of our oldest zoos have lost any touch with their history and simply bulldoze older building, that may still yet have some value.
I really liked visiting Audubon Zoo and seeing how they're preserving their WPA heritage such as how they decided to not bulldoze the old elephant house (that formerly housed Panya & Jean) and renovated it for their Orangutans. My favorite thing was the facade of the new elephant house and how it was constructed to look like their old exhibit. Asian Elephant Exhibit View 2 by Sarus Crane posted 19 Sep 2019 at 6:34 PM
Thank you for your very interesting post with all the fascinating historic photos of Antwerp Zoo. Antwerp is one of my favourite zoos and I particularly like the way the old rhinoceros house has been incorporated into the walk-through aviary / buffalo exhibit. I can remember seeing the female northern white rhino "Chloe" in the old rhino house on my first few visits to Antwerp Zoo. Are you sure, though, that northern white rhinos actually bred in Antwerp Zoo? Rookmaaker doesn't list any Northern white rhino births at Antwerp in his book The Rhinoceros in Captivity
All of Tiergarten Schoenbrunn In all seriousness, though, they have done a great job of turning old, outdated and small enclosures into modern and acceptable exhibits. For example, the old hippo house was turned into a house for rats and the giraffe house was renovated to make it a very nice exhibit. They even took some of the old big cat cages and incorporated them into the new exhibits, showing how the exhibits have improved over the years. So many more examples in that zoo or old architecture being turned into something wonderful (Bird house, East African house, Orangerie). I find myself thinking about how London would look if it had got the same work done on it.
My home zoo, Maryland Zoo, they recently renovated the lion, elephant, and giraffe exhibits, which got rid of the historical penguin rock, even though it had been empty. New:
