Knoxville’s planned Women’s Suffrage Museum just got a lot bigger, with organizers closing on a second downtown building Tuesday and expanding the future cultural center’s footprint near the heart of the city.
The Suffrage Coalition completed the purchase of the adjacent Gay Street property, officials told WBIR. The building sits a few streets from Knoxville’s women’s suffrage monument on Market Square, giving the long-planned museum a larger downtown presence before it even opens.
Second Building Expands The Museum’s Ambition
The museum project now encompasses two South Gay Street buildings between the historic Bijou Theatre and Tennessee Theatre, according to the Women’s Suffrage Museum. The organization’s plans call for immersive exhibits, educational programming and event space focused on the movement that led to the 19th Amendment.
A spring development packet from the Downtown Knoxville Alliance described a roughly 20,000-square-foot project, including additional floors and renovations across both buildings. The materials estimated total project costs at $25 million to $27 million, with construction expected to begin in 2027 and completion targeted for 2028.
The second property has been part of the vision since November 2025, when the coalition announced it had purchased the first building and received a $500,000 donation from Knoxville developer Tim Hill to help pursue the expansion. The museum’s official announcement said the completed project would house more than 1,000 historic artifacts, many of them expected to be displayed publicly for the first time.
Knoxville’s Suffrage Story Gets A Permanent Home
Tennessee’s role gives the project a particularly strong local hook: The state became the 36th and final state needed to ratify the 19th Amendment in 1920. A June profile in the Citizen Tribune reported that founder Wanda Sobieski has spent decades building the collection and pushing for a permanent museum in Knoxville.
The city already marks that history with the Tennessee Woman Suffrage Memorial on Market Square, honoring Lizzie Crozier French, Anne Dallas Dudley and Elizabeth Avery Meriwether, according to Visit Knoxville. The new museum is expected to open in 2028, turning those downtown reminders into part of a larger place for visitors to learn how Tennessee helped push women’s voting rights over the finish line.
