Frontier Texas!

Funded by the City of Abilene, TxDOT and private donations, Frontier Texas! has two distinct but related components.

One-third of the building is a visitor center for the Abilene area and for the Texas Forts Trail, which begin and end in Abilene. The remainder of the building is a regional history museum focusing on the development of the Texas frontier from 1770 to 1870. The design contrasts gabled volumes of heavy masonry and metal roofs with open running porches supported by slender columns. Intended to recall the site organization of frontier forts, the project includes 15,000 SF of enclosed space plus another 6,000 feet of sheltered area, arranged to define three sides of a parade ground. This project won the AIA Dallas Chapter Design Merit Award in 2005.