After a 10-year absence and four years of fundraising and construction, Houston Zoo in Texas is about to open its new state-of-the-art gorilla exhibit to the public, allowing visitors to see the primates explore their new habitat.

Designed by the Seattle-based Portico Group, the 30,000sq ft (2,787sq m) US$28m (€24.7m, £17.8m) enclosure, which includes a 4,000sq ft (371sq m) indoor shelter, opens to the public on 22 May. The landscape, which mimics an African forest, includes a 23-foot-tall climbing tree and a behind-the-scenes outdoor yard.

The exhibit, which has been designed to bring man and gorilla as close as possible, will lure the animals into quiet, shaded areas — some of which feature a glass wall to allow guests an eye-to-eye encounter with the endangered primates. Elevated walkways offer another unique opportunity to see gorillas inside a canopy of seven 100-year-old oak trees that have been relocated from other parts of the zoo.

Seven western lowland gorillas, which have come from the Bronx Zoo in New York, Audubon Zoo in New Orleans and Riverbanks Zoo in South Carolina, inhabit the new exhibit. The habitat also includes three red river hogs found throughout the gorillas' home turf in West Africa.