Old Exhibits That Still Hold Up Well

If there’s one Aquarium exhibit that has hold up significantly well even if it only got renovated back in 2013, that has to be New England Aquarium’s Giant Ocean Tank. I’ve been there twice, once as a kid in 2014 a year after it’s renovation was done, and again as a young teenager in last year, to an extent that the Giant Ocean Tank is still a timeless piece of aquarium architecture ever since it was built in the beginning of the 1970s. It astonishes yet amazes me that an Aquarium from Boston of all places can genuinely leave a pro-founding impact to someone who loves ocean life that beautifully depicts a Caribbean Coral Reef right in the center of the Aquarium with lots of iconic marine life, including Myrtle the green sea turtle who has been in the Aquarium since 1970.
 
JVM said:
Denver Zoo's Primate Panorama has a few dated areas but the overall complex feels like something that could be built today, save for the sheer ambition that it originally held over twenty-five species of primate.

Milwaukee County Zoo's bird house was renovated in the 90s and is my favorite bird building I've been to. It's not overly reliant on massive aviaries with dozens of species - leaving most exhibits to a couple at a time lets me breathe and focus on the individual residents, rather than sometimes in a large aviary of two dozen birds focusing on one or two major ones at the expense of others. It covers a lot of biomes and the inclusion of penguins and mouse deer add a little extra punch.

The best picks in Chicago have largely been mentioned. I would definitely want to add the Swamp for Brookfield Zoo though, save the river otter exhibit.
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Also Denver Zoo's Tropical Discovery I think has held up fairly well as well.
 
Brayden Delashmutt said:
I was just going to say that - the Bronx’s exhibits have held up very well even if they are pretty old.
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Of course. As much as some zoos exhibits slowly wither away into obscurity and are in need of desperate renovations, it’s honestly beautiful how much the Bronx Zoo has came so far with their timeless exhibits from the 1940s all the way to the 1990s. No doubt my favorite zoo to visit since childhood when I was five years old.
 
Fallax said:
Does the 90s count as old? I feel like most exhibits opened in the 90s are probably still in use. I would be more interested in hearing about much older exhibits still in use.
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^^^ This. Most exhibits built post 1990 in newer zoos or city zoos will still be decent. Primate World and the Main/Tropics Aviary in ZooTampa is largely the same as it was when the "new zoo" opened in the late 1980s and it is still adequate and "holds up" for the most part. The Florida Aquarium opened in 1995 and has seen upgrades, but the centerpiece Wetlands dome is largely the same.

Honestly, anything built after the late 1990s that that does not hold up would be the exception IMO.
 
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Woodland Park Zoo's Northern Trail. The complex opened in 1994, and a majority of the exhibits hold up quite well.
 
SwampDonkey said:
^^^ This. Most exhibits built post 1990 in newer zoos or city zoos will still be decent. Primate World and the Main/Tropics Aviary in ZooTampa is largely the same as it was when the "new zoo" opened in the late 1980s and it is still adequate and "holds up" for the most part. The Florida Aquarium opened in 1995 and has seen upgrades, but the centerpiece Wetlands dome is largely the same.

Honestly, anything built after the late 1990s that that does not hold up would be the exception IMO.
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I would agree with the late 1990s cutoff; definitely closer to the end of the decade than the beginning. There were a lot of early 90s cat, primate and bear exhibits that weren't or aren't considered up to current standards, especially in the midwest where indoor habitats were still a significant factor, but by the late 90s you already see the seeds of more modern renovations.
 
Exhibits built from 30+ years ago that you think are still above-average quality for the animals they hold?
 
I never cease to be fascinated by the East African Kopje at San Diego Zoo. It was built in the 80’s and the mixed species habitat is a treasure trove of photo opportunities. The photo below I caught last visit and always make a point to stop by no matter what time of the day.
 

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The Kelp Forest in Monterey Bay Aquarium opened 40 years ago in 1984 and is still ground breaking.

The Florida Wetlands Dome in the Florida Aquarium just missed the 30 year mark having opened in 1995, but it has only gotten better as it aged.
 
Almost the entirety of the Minnesota Zoo opened in 1978 and holds up remarkably well. Some of the exhibits on the Northern Trail (Camel/Wild Horse, Moose, Tiger) still manage to be some of the best in the country, and in the case of the tiger exhibit, the world.
 
I think the Giraffe House at London holds up well. I don't mean this to say it has aged perfectly and couldn't be improved; what I do mean to say is that there are giraffe buildings and exhibits from as recently as twenty years ago that aren't very much better than a building opened for the same purpose that is nearing one hundred and ninety. It's not perfect but it's not nearly as egregiously out of date as the time period would imply.
 
elefante said:
Most exhibits in the Detroit Zoo appear to be more than 20 years old and they hold up well. Not a bad exhibit there except the bear grottoes could use some updating.
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It could also use some more bears. They combined the three east displays into one and there's usually nothing in the display behind the building. The combination was part of the previous director's attempt at substantially reducing the collection, which I'm not happy about, but the exhibit is in good shape

The reptile house is over sixty years old and is still OK.
 
I'd argue that the original gorilla exhibit at Woodland Park still holds up as the first of its kind.
 
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