1. Sri Lankan Art and Cultural Museum
Sri Lankan Art and Cultural Museum
The first of its kind outside of Sri Lanka, the Sri Lankan Art and Cultural Museum opened in 2017, featuring Sri Lankan art, Buddha statues, gemstones, and even ceremonial weapons. The museum was opened by Julia Wijesinghe when she was only 18 years old, and Wijesinghe resettled the museum to a larger space at 61 Canal Street in Stapleton in 2018. Her father, Lakruwana Wijesinghe, opened up one of the first Sri Lankan restaurants in the United States and inspired her to share Sri Lankan culture with her community.
Sri Lankan Art and Cultural Museum plaque
Julia first began to plan the museum at just age 15, inspired by yearly visits to her grandmother in Colombo. She began to gather a collection of Sri Lankan artifacts and shipped them to New York. With her father’s help, she accumulated objects like musical instruments, religious objects, cooking materials, rubber tree logs, and palm-leaf books and opened up her museum originally in the basement of her father’s restaurant. Proceeds from the museum go to the Lakruwana foundation, a non-profit organization that donates to a school in Ratnapura, Sri Lanka. Check out a video of her speaking about her heritage at the museum’s opening.