Star Wars: The Experience – A Journey Through the Galaxy will open at The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia on February 13, 2027. The new exhibition is set to lead off a five-year tour of North America, giving the museum a long runway with a project tied to the Star Wars 50th anniversary celebration.
More than 70 Lucasfilm artifacts are included, many of them on view for the first time. The lineup reaches beyond familiar display pieces: Darth Vader’s armor, Darth Maul’s lightsaber hilt, Grogu, R2-D2, C-3PO, a full-sized speeder bike, and original props from Andor all sit inside an 18,000-square-foot installation built as a world-premiere attraction.
Philadelphia gets the first look
Larry Dubinski said The Franklin Institute is excited to put Philadelphia once again at the center of a major cultural moment with another blockbuster world premiere exhibition in 2027. The museum’s role is not just as host but as the opening stop for a touring show that has to work as both a local draw and a traveling package for North America.
That setup is why the schedule matters. A February 13, 2027 opening gives the institution a fixed launch date while also starting the countdown on the five-year tour, which means the exhibit has to land immediately with visitors and still carry enough scale to move beyond Philadelphia and keep its appeal intact over time.
Ashley Eckstein at San Diego Comic-Con
On Friday, July 24, 2026, at 4:00, Ashley Eckstein is scheduled to host a San Diego Comic-Con panel that will give fans the first look at exhibit renderings and other new details. Eckstein, the voice of Ahsoka Tano in Star Wars: The Clone Wars and other animated tales, gives the preview a direct link to the franchise’s screen history.
That preview arrives before the exhibition opens, which is the wrinkle here: the show is being positioned as a world premiere in 2027, yet some of its visuals will surface months earlier in panel form. The early reveal should help build demand without giving away the full physical experience, especially for a project that includes an RFID-powered experience alongside artifacts and large-scale displays.
Inside the 18,000 square feet
The exhibition was created by The Franklin Institute in collaboration with MDSX, Lucasfilm, and Disney Consumer Products after more than four years of work. Its scope is unusually broad for a museum exhibition, mixing screen-used objects with interactive technology and enough floor space to support a sustained crowd flow.
For visitors, the practical takeaway is simple: the Philadelphia stop is not a one-week novelty run but the first chance to see a long-term exhibit built for repeated attendance and later travel. The broader question is how much fresh material the full installation will hold beyond the named artifacts and the renderings teased at San Diego Comic-Con, because that is what will determine whether the opening feels like a complete premiere or just the start of a much larger rollout.
