Freedom House Restoration Makes Progress In Alexandria

ALEXANDRIA, VA — Freedom House's restoration work is making progress, with the new facade being revealed to the public.

The Office of Historic Alexandria started the restoration project at 1315 Duke Street in June 2024 to stabilize the building and facilitate a return to its pre-Civil War appearance. The building has a new rehabilitated front façade. The front of the building has been returned to its pre-Civil War appearance. Work will now move to the north side of the building. Work is expected to be complete by December 2025.

The work has included adjusting west elevation window openings to appear as they did in Civil War photographs, returning 12-over-12 sash single-hung windows and shutters to the front, updating the building colors using scientific paint analysis, replacing the 1905 roof with a side-gable roof and returning a second entryway on the first floor. Oak Grove Restoration Company is leading the restoration project on behalf of the city.

As of May 5, the museum was temporarily closed to visitors for the front restoration. The museum is expected to remain closed through July, with potential reopening in August.

The Freedom House Museum is the former site of a slave jail for Franklin and Armfield, one of the country's largest slave trading companies. According to the city's website, the location was used as a slave jail or pen between 1828 and 1836, holding slaves shipped from Northern Virginia to cotton and sugar plantations in the South. After Franklin and Armfield, the complex was used by other slave trading companies. The complex is associated with trafficking thousands of Black men, women and children between 1828 and 1861. Today, it is a museum documenting the history of Alexandria's enslaved and free Black people. The city purchased Freedom House from the Urban League of Northern Virginia in 2020.