In a "save the date" alert, leaders of the $185 million Perot Museum of Nature and Science have penciled Dec. 1 as the grand opening for the long-awaited venue.

Tickets go on sale Oct. 2 for the museum, situated on a 4.7-acre site at 2201 N. Field St., slightly north of the downtown. The museum is named after Margot and Ross Perot, whose children donated $50 million in May 2008 to jump-start the fund-raising campaign for the project, designed by Thom Mayne, 2005 Pritzker Architecture Prize laureate, and Morphosis Architects.

"The Perot Museum brings together a Pritzker Prize-winning architect, a bold and innovative landscape architect, and some of the world's best exhibit designers. They've created a leading-edge, very high-tech, mind-shaping experience for everyone – from infants and toddlers, to students and scholars, to novices and lifelong learners," said Nicole G. Small, The Eugene McDermott CEO of the Perot Museum of Nature and Science.

The overall building mass is conceived as a large cube floating over the site's landscaped plinth, a landscaped base with an acre of rolling roofscape. Rock and native drought-resistant grasses were used to reflect Texas' indigenous landscape and create a living system that will evolve naturally over time. Dallas-based Talley Associates was the landscape architect.

The 180,000-square-foot museum contains five floors of public space with 11 permanent exhibit halls, including a children's museum complete with outdoor play space/courtyard and a state-of-the-art hall designed for traveling exhibitions. It also features an expansive glass-enclosed lobby and adjacent rooftop deck; multi-media, 3-D digital cinema with seating for 297; flexible-space auditorium; cafe; and retail store.

By November 2011, the entire $185 million had been raised, with the funds covering the costs of the site acquisition, exhibition planning and design, museum construction, education programs and an endowment.

The Perot Museum is on track to earn LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council; Green Globes Certification from the Green Building Initiative; and the Sustainable Sites Initiative, which emphasizes landscape and site design.