The Elvehjem produces about 16 exhibitions throughout the year. It also sponsors lectures, films, gallery talks and a Sunday chamber music series. Catalogs and brochures are regularly published to accompany major exhibitions. The museum is open 9 AM to 5 PM Tuesday through Friday and 11 AM to 5 PM Saturday and Sunday. It's closed on Mondays and some holidays.
Admission is free.
Access to an elevator is available from the Murray Street entrance. Associated with the UW-Madison's School of Human Ecology, the Gallery of Design is one of the university's newest artistic centers, having opened in 1991. It offers lectures and other educational activities in addition to exhibitions centering around the design of living spaces and textiles. Although rarely on display for the general public, the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection, considered one of the largest and most comprehensive university textile collections in the country at 12,000 pieces strong, is housed here. Strengths of the collection include American quilts and coverlets, American and European domestic needlework and ethnographic textiles from Latin America and Southeast Asia.