MOUNT VERNON, Va.-
New facilities, a craft fair and fall foliage all make this a good time of year to pay a visit to George Washington's Mount Vernon estate.
The craft fair, which features a recreation of an 18th-century marketplace with costumed re-enactors, will be held at Mount Vernon on Sept. 16-17. Activities include craft demonstrations, family entertainment and sightseeing cruises on the Potomac River.
Two new visitor facilities, the Ford Orientation Center and the Donald W. Reynolds Museum and Education Center, open Oct. 27. The Ford center offers an action-adventure movie on Washington's life, and "Mount Vernon in Miniature," a 1/12 scale exact replica of Washington's home, which gives visitors a bird's-eye view of the mansion.
The Reynolds museum has galleries and theater spaces, interactive displays, films and other high-tech experiences, including life-size models of the president at three stages in his life. It also houses furnishings, china, silver, clothing, jewelry, Revolutionary War artifacts, rare books and other personal effects of the Washington family. Many of these treasures will be exhibited at Mount Vernon for the first time in the new museum.
The complex that houses the new buildings was built so that most of it is located under the four-acre pasture inside Mount Vernon's main gate, to ensure that the pastoral setting and views to and from the mansion are preserved. Sheep like those Washington raised 200 years ago will graze in the pasture. Some 65 mature trees–some up to 40 feet tall–were also planted to buffer the landscape between the new buildings and the surrounding historic area.
The trees include elms, maples, tulip poplars, oak, beech, and American holly trees, varieties which would have been found in George Washington's woods in the 18th century.
The Mount Vernon estate includes Washington's home and gardens, 16 miles from the nation's capital. It's open for tours year-round, with September-October hours from 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Admission is $13 for adults; children 6-11, $6; children 5 and under, free.
For more information, visit or call 703-780-2000.
