Monday, during a Presidents Day ceremony, President Lincoln’s Cottage at the Soldiers’ Home, located in northwestern Washington D.C., was reopened to the public. The cottage was occupied by the President and his family during the summers of 1862, 1863 and 1864.

President Lincoln’s Cottage is located on the grounds of the Armed Forces Retirement Home in northwest Washington, D.C. CNN reports that the project took almost ten years to complete; nearly $15 million were used to restore the 34 rooms of the presidential cottage. The house features original furnishings and woodwork.

Richard Moe, president of the National Trust of Historic Preservation, was the one that took the restoration project in his hands.

“This isn't a traditional museum with velvet ropes and a lot of furniture; this is a museum of ideas: Union, freedom, emancipation. Those are the ideas that made us the country we are today,” Moe was quoted by CBS News as saying.

President Lincoln, who was shot on April 14, 1865 by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre, evacuated the cottage in July 1864 during a Confederate attack that took place at Fort Stevens, about a mile away from the President’s summer place.

The cottage is the place where the President worked on the Emancipation Proclamation.

“We believe the place can tell stories, it’s one thing to read history; it's another thing to walk through and touch it and feel it,” Moe told CBS News. “It really comes alive in a different kind of way … that's what happens when you walk through this cottage. Abraham Lincoln comes alive.”

After President Lincoln’s death, the cottage was used to host President Rutherford B. Hayes during the summers, from 1877 to 1880 and also President Chester A. Arthur in the winter of 1882, while the White House was under repair.

For further details, visit http://www.lincolncottage.org/.