Work has started on the Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners-designed International Spy Museum, which is making a a US$162m (€143.2m, £102.1m) move to property developer JBG Companies’ L’Enfant Plaza.

The deal was announced on 15 June after 18 months of negotiations, with the 140,000sq ft (13,000sq m) space in Washington D.C. funded through US$65m (€57.4m, £41m) coming from the museum’s owners and the remainder sourced through public fundraising and corporate sponsors, as well as a US$50m (€44.4m, £35m) tax-exempt bond issue.

“The ownership group of the museum went in front of the Commission of Fine Arts in D.C. and presented our plans for what we’d like to do to move the museum to this space at L’Enfant Plaza,” said Jason Werden, public relations manager for the International Spy Museum, speaking to CLAD about the project last year.

“We want a space where we can fully expand the museum and have our own footprint there. As of now we are still moving the process forward and hope to relocate by 2017 to the new space.”

Museum officials have been seeking a move from the International Spy Museum’s current home since 2013. Initial plans would have seen the museum move into an expanded Carnegie Library, but the District’s historic preservation panel vetoed the proposal, declaring that the plan did not meet preservation guidelines.

Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners create new US$162m home for Washington's International Spy Museum