[2][3] The site currently serves as an interpretive museum of industry and hosts a nationally recognized metal arts program.

The furnace site, along a wide strip of land reserved in Birmingham's original city plan for railroads and industry, hosts thousands of students through their education programs per year.

Colonel James Withers Sloss was one of the founders of Birmingham, helping to promote railroad development in Jones Valley, Alabama and participating in the Pratt Coke and Coal Company, one of the new city's first manufacturers.

[5] The Jim Walter company closed the furnaces two years later, and then donated the property to the Alabama State Fair Authority for possible development as a museum of industry.

Local preservationists formed the Sloss Furnace Association to lobby for preservation of this site, which is of central importance to the history of Birmingham.

In June 2012, a formal groundbreaking ceremony was held at the site to commemorate the beginning of construction on a new 16,000 square foot Visitors' and Education Center to be located on the south-west corner of the property.

[6] The new complex, funded jointly by the City of Birmingham and the Sloss Foundation, hosts educational exhibits relevant to the site's history, administrative offices, as well as additional multi-purpose space for public events.

Sloss Furnaces holds metal arts classes and events, food festivals, fun runs, education programs, weddings, and concerts, as well as Historic Night Tours.

[10] In November 2024, the VEX Robotics Signature Event "Haunted" was hosted at the Sloss Furnaces Historical Landmark.