Welcome Home: NMAAHC Celebrates 10 Years With The Reunion
Ten years after the National Museum of African American History and Culture opened on the National Mall, everybody is being invited back home.
The Reunion runs September 24-27, 2026 under the theme 'Welcome Home: Our Legacy Continues.' The museum describes it as a multi-day anniversary gathering for visitors, supporters, partners and communities that helped make the institution possible.
A museum anniversary built like a homecoming
The weekend includes daytime museum programming, an anniversary conversation with Smithsonian Secretary and founding NMAAHC director Lonnie G. Bunch III, The Purple Ball: Echoes of the Pearl, and Violet Vibes at The Wharf.
Purple is encouraged throughout the celebration, tying the visual identity of the weekend to the museum's anniversary.
The Wharf carries history
The Purple Ball's 'Echoes of the Pearl' theme points directly to the 1848 Pearl escape attempt, when 77 enslaved people boarded a schooner from Washington's waterfront in an effort to reach freedom. The anniversary therefore extends beyond a building and back into the geography of Black history in the city.
That choice makes the celebration more than a birthday party. It connects institution, memory and place.
Ten years is a checkpoint, not a finish line
NMAAHC opened in September 2016 after generations of advocacy for a national museum dedicated to African American history and culture. Its first decade has made it a major public-history institution and a destination for visitors from around the world.
For BCW, The Reunion belongs in both the calendar and the cultural record: a reminder that a museum can be archive, gathering space and homecoming all at once.
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