A little over 15 years ago, George Wagner was flipping through books in at an architectural bookstore in Toronto. He was reading about how Toronto’s mayor had brought an event similar to Doors Open to the city around 2000.

Soon, he was on a plane to Denver to check out their version of Doors Open. He then went on to found Doors Open Milwaukee.

“The thing that impressed me the most was the smiles on people’s faces as they were walking around,” Wagner recalls. “Denver has some really excellent buildings, however I knew that in Milwaukee, we actually had more.”

Wagner was working at Milwaukee Central Library at the time, and had done tours with Historic Milwaukee before. He pitched the idea to them, and then got to work getting some notable buildings downtown on board. He started with his workplace at Milwaukee Central Library. He then coaxed people at Milwaukee City Hall and the then-US Bank building, getting them on board.