The raven has landed and found a permanent home in Poe Park.  

“It’s supposed to look like a raven taking off,” said Zach Hudson, an education assistant at the Bronx Historical Society, referring to the design of the Kingsbridge Road park’s new visitors center. The structure’s floor plan pays homage to the ‘The Raven,’ the famed poem by Edgar Allan Poe, the park and center’s namesake. 

The 2,700-square-foot, single-story building, which the Parks Department expects to complete by March or April of next year, will have a V-shaped roof and exterior walls covered with overlapping feather-like shingles, to give it a bird-like essence. 

The center will also house a large glass window at the north end that frames a view of Poe Cottage, the poet’s last home, which sits 50 yards away. 

To further mirror Poe’s supernatural tone, entrances are hidden to “promote a sensation of sliding in between walls,” according to the Parks Department.

The Toshiko Mori Architecture firm won the 2007 New York City Art Commission Design Award for the building’s concept. 

“It’s enough to catch people’s eye,” Hudson said. “It fits in with the theme of borough history and of Poe.”

Like many public spaces in the Bronx, Poe Park is no stranger to urban blight. But, the public park has undergone major renovations within the last decade and is experiencing a renaissance.  Thanks in large part to the advocacy of the non-profit organization, the Fordham Bedford Housing Corporation, the visitors center will be the latest addition in a long list of improvements aimed at promoting the area, including the current children’s playground and restored band shell at the south end of the park.

“The park in good shape and has been for quite some time,” said Kathy McAuley, the director of Poe Cottage, “and the visitors center will make it that [much] more appealing and provide that many more amenities for [the] community and visitors.”

The exact programming of the visitors center is still a pending discussion with the Parks Department, McAuley said, but is envisioned as a space for community groups to host art, cultural, and educational activities. Classroom space and computer stations are expected to be available for research. 

“It will be a tourism center as well for the borough,” she added, hoping that the information desk in the building will serve as a reception area for local and international groups that already visit Poe Cottage. 

Rosemary Morales, an 8th grader at PS 105 in Queens, whose English class recently toured the cottage and looks forward to the completion of the center, said, “It’s one of the coolest field trips I have ever done.”

In addition to the center’s potential for promoting the Fordham community, Rosanna Viera, a park supporter at the Fordham Bedford Housing Corporation, is most excited about a more practical use of the visitors center. 

 “[Visitors] need a place to go the bathroom,” said Viera, referring to the international tourists, local children and immediate community that will all benefit from the visitor center’s new comfort stations.  Despite the numerous school and private tours that pass through the park weekly, the area currently lacks bathroom facilities. 

The over $4.1 million visitors center received funding from the mayor and the Bronx Borough President’s office, but the majority of the project’s financing came from Councilmember Joel Rivera.

Although the Parks Department originally estimated for the center to be open for business by the end of December, McAuley still says, “It will be very exciting once it’s all done and open to the public.”