The Peale Museum on Holliday Street occupies the first building in the United States to be designed and built specifically as a museum. It is ready to reopen after a $5.5 million renovation. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

The Peale Museum on Holliday Street occupies the first building in the United States to be designed and built specifically as a museum. It is ready to reopen after a $5.5 million renovation. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Peale Museum director Nancy Proctor explains a display that recalls the Peale Museum building’s use as Male and Female Colored School No. 1 in the late 1800s. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

The Peale Museum on Holliday Street occupies the first building in the United States to be designed and built specifically as a museum. It is ready to reopen after a $5.5 million renovation. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

A gas-powered streetlight in the Peale Museum’s garden is a nod to its founder inventor and entrepreneur Rembrandt Peale, who joined with a group of investors to start the Baltimore Gas Company in 1816. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

A large pediment from the First Union Bank Building, built in 1806, was moved to the Peale when the museum’s garden was created during the 1930 renovation. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Peale Museum director Nancy Proctor explains a display that recalls the Peale Museum building’s use as Male and Female Colored School No. 1 in the late 1800s. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Irene Chan’s installation titled “The Thomas Project: 2022” is on display at the Peale Museum. It features pieces remembering Thomas Sylvanus, who was born in China, brought to America in the 1850s and enslaved in Baltimore before running away to join the Union Army. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Baltimore artist Lauren Muney’s hand-cut silhouette portraits of Baltimore City residents adorn the moulding on the first floor of The Peale. Several of the portraits are interactive and visitors can hear stories from the subjects using a phone app. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Peale Museum director Nancy Proctor descends the staircase in the recently renovated building. The museum reopens this weekend. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)