Nori - the Chinese dragon with a Japanese name - welcomes visitors to the Providence Children's Museum from his rooftop perch in Providence, Rhode Island. His massive green head -- with a pair of white antlers and yellow fins - hangs over the northeast corner of the building and looks to Parsonage Street. Around the opposite side of the building, his humongous tail swoops down to the entrance at the parking lot. From the museum's
The Story of Nori: A Dragon Tale
Once upon a time, not so very long ago, a Children’s Museum and a Chinese dragon moved to Providence.
In 1997, the Museum was preparing to move from Pawtucket to its current building, which housed a printing business in the 1930s and, a little later, jewelry manufacturing. Prior to the move, the Museum completely renovated the building’s interior, created two floors of imaginative exhibits, and added the atrium walkway, workshop, parking lot and landscaping, all while keeping the building’s historic character.
At the same time the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston was ready to part with a colorful dragon head, originally created for a Chinese painting exhibit by Symmetry Products (located in Lincoln, RI).
And so the dragon came to perch upon the Museum’s rooftop in July 1997.
Two years later, Julie Lancia of Symmetry Products volunteered to create a dragon tail to mark the Museum entrance. In conjunction, the Museum held a “name the dragon” contest. The new tail was unveiled and the name announced – Nori, suggested by 11-year-old Michael Felmly of Newport.
Although Nori is a Chinese dragon (or lung), Michael named him after a Japanese friend. The word refers to a kind of seaweed (and a seaweed dish) and Nori is a water creature, as all Asian dragons are – appropriate, as he lives in the Ocean State. Also common to Chinese dragons, Nori is a benevolent spirit.
(June 2013)