There are lot of art museums in New York and some of them are not very family friendly. Some even have minimum age requirements. That is not the case for the Whitney Museum of American Art. The Whitney Museum of American Art is extremely welcoming to families. In fact, they have events and activities for all ages including Strollers Tours, Kid's Tours and Open Studio time. Stroller tours are pretty self explanatory. Kid's Tours are for children ages 5 and up, and they are free with admission to the museum. They are given about 3 times a day on Saturdays. However, you must sign up in advance and only a limited amount of people are allowed on each tour so if you go to the museum and you are interested in that, you should sign up right away. If you think a kid's tour is going to be an exhausting trek through the museum with a bunch of bored little kids, don't worry the tours are nothing like that. The tours are short and very interactive. They involve visits to only two different works of art. I am not sure if they are always the same two works of art or this varies, however. The two art works are discussed in a fun way for kids where the kids are asked a lot of questions and able to give their opinions a lot. Also, kids get to search for things in the artwork and even get to do a little drawing of their own. Open studio is also on Saturdays but does not require a ticket or registration. It gives kids the opportunity to create their own works of art related to a particular work of art that is currently in the museum. Each week a different work of art is chosen for inspiration. Open Studio runs from 10:30 AM to 3:00 PM. If you are not a kid and you do not have a kid and you are afraid that with all this family friendliness, the Whitney must be a noisy, crazy place with kids running all over. Don't be. It is actually pretty quiet and peaceful. Since the museum is so welcoming to kids, they are kept busy, happy and entertained there. Therefore, they have no reason to run wild and annoy other museum guests and that makes the Whitney Museum of American Art a great place to visit for everyone.
