As the next significant and exciting step in our work to preserve the historic Southwest Museum Site, the National Trust team and our broad-based Steering Committee of experts have developed a detailed Request for Interest (RFI) with the property owner, the Autry Museum of the American West, to solicit innovative and thoughtful concepts that reactivate the Los Angeles landmark and icon of the Highland Park neighborhood as a community asset.

The RFI draws upon the careful community engagement, survey, and research we’ve conducted in the past few years to establish a set of fundamental criteria that we believe must guide any successful and sustainable approach to the property:

• Commitment –A clear commitment to preserving the historic structures and celebrating the history of the site and the legacy of its founder, Charles Lummis;
• Capacity – Demonstrate the organizational and financial capacity to undertake a project of this scale and complexity, and sustain operations over the long term;
• Community – Consider and reflect the priorities that have been expressed by the surrounding community, connecting the property and its uses to its neighborhood and greater Los Angeles; and
• Collection – Include opportunities for public programming that draws on the Autry’s historic Southwest Museum of the American Indian Collection.

Tours of the Southwest Museum campus , the Casa de Adobe and the Resources Center of the Autry will be offered in the next few months to allow all interested parties to see the sites and the collection first-hand.

We encourage a wide variety of ideas and welcome responses from major institutions to real estate brokers to local non-profits to community stakeholders. We hope you’ll submit your concept and encourage others to do so as well!

Questions about the RFI can be sent to the Autry and National Trust team at SouthwestRFI@theAutry.org. The deadline for responses to the RFI is June 10.