Submitted by WA ContentsOMA-designed New Museum expansion is set to open in Fall 2025 United States Architecture News - Feb 27, 2025 - 15:15 html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"The New Museum has today revealed that its new building expansion, designed by OMA/Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas, in collaboration with Cooper Robertson, will open to the public this fall.Encompassing a total of 60,000 square foot (5,574 square meters), the OMA-designed addition will double the Museum's gallery space - by adding a total of 9,600 square foot (892 square meters) and blend in with the current SANAA-designed flagship building on the Bowery at Prince Street.Among many other new and expanded features, it will create a purpose-built home for the Museum's cultural incubator NEW INC, create new venues for artist residencies and public programs, improve visitor flow with the addition of three elevators, an atrium stair, and an entrance plaza, and mark a turning point for the city and the Museum.GalleriesThe New Museum was established in 1977 at a temporary location on Hudson Street. Since then, it has experimented and changed as a center for new ideas and art, growing at significant points in its history to better serve the public and artists. The New Museum is Manhattans only museum dedicated exclusively to contemporary art."The New Museum is an incubator for new cultural perspectives and production, and the expansion aims to embody that attitude of openness," said Shohei Shigematsu, OMA Partner."Imagined as a highly connected yet distinct counterpart to the existing museums verticality and solidity, the new building will offer horizontally expansive galleries for curatorial variety, open vertical circulation, and a diversity of spaces for gathering, exchange, and creation.""The building is further shaped to create an active public faceincluding an outdoor plaza at the ground, moments of transparency throughout the central atrium, and terraced openings at the topthat will openly engage the surrounding community and beyond," Shigematsu added.Atrium stairToby Devan Lewis, a longtime New Museum Trustee whose $30 million gift to the Capital Campaign is the largest gift in the Museum's history, will be honored with the name of the OMA building. With $82 million in building expenditures, the New Museum has generated $118 million thus far toward its $125 million Capital Campaign goal."The New Museum has always been a future-facing museumnot a place for preserving and recording history, but a place where history is made," said Lisa Phillips, Toby Devan Lewis Director of the New Museum."We are thrilled to be working with Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas on OMAs first public building in New York City, ushering in a new era of possibilities for the New Museum as a vital civic resource for New Yorkers and the global arts community," Phillips added.The OMA-designed addition will blend in seamlessly on the inside while looking distinctive on the outside, complementing the New Museum's existing architecture. The Museum's exhibition area will be doubled in the new seven-story structure, with the second, third, and fourth level ceiling heights aligned to allow for seamless communication between the two structures.With the capacity to function independently or seamlessly integrate with the current galleries, the new galleries will provide much-needed space for shows that are highly flexible and flow horizontally across the buildings.Through the addition of three more elevators, two of which will be used for gallery access, and an atrium stairway that will provide views of the neighborhood and the chance for site-specific art installations, the OMA design will enhance vertical circulation for visitors.A new entry plaza would establish an outdoor space for public art installations at the intersection of Bowery and Prince Street, while the Museum's expanded lobby on the ground floor will house a full-service caf and an expanded bookstore.The new structure will house a 74-seat forum, a dedicated studio for artists-in-residence, and a specially designed residence for NEW INC, the first museum-born cultural incubator. It will provide its yearly cohort of more than 120 creative entrepreneurs with state-of-the-art production facilities and collaborative workspaces.ForumWith three more upper-floor terraces overlooking the Bowery, the New Museum's seventh-floor Sky Room will increase in size while maintaining its expansive vistas of downtown Manhattan.Using materials that evoke and compliment the old SANAA structure, laminated glass with metal mesh will create a basic, cohesive facade on the outside while enabling a greater level of transparency.New Humans: Memories of the Future will open the expanded building with an exploration of artists' ongoing concern with what it means to be human in the face of rapid technological change, continuing the New Museum's long tradition of showcasing thought-provoking and topical exhibitions. In addition to New Humans, the expanded New Museum will reopen with multiple site-specific commissions enabled by new architectural spaces.The New Museum will reveal its 2026 exhibition schedule later this year. It will feature the first solo exhibition of artist Arthur Jafa at the New York Museum as well as the upcoming New Museum Triennial, which was introduced in 2009 as the first recurring international exhibition in New York City dedicated to up-and-coming artists from around the globe.Project factsProject name:New Museum ExpansionArchitects: OMA/Shohei Shigematsu and Rem KoolhaasLocation:New York, USALocal architect:Cooper RobertsonNew Museum Building Project Coordinator: New Museum, Dennis Szakacs, Chief Operating OfficerProject and Cost Management:Gardiner and Theobald, Jonathan Andrew, Senior Director, Stephen Becker, Director (PM), Michael J. Day, Associate Director (Cost); PML, Peter Lehrer, President, Scott Weisberg, Executive Vice President & COOConstruction Manager:F.J. Sciame Construction, Co., Inc, Joseph Mizzi, President and Chief Operating Services Officer, Steven Colletta, Senior Vice President, Thomas Sevchuk, Vice PresidentStructural Engineer: ARUP, Matt Jackson, Principal, and Christopher Adams, Senior Structural EngineerMechanical Systems: ARUP, Matt Jackson, Principal, and Neil Muir, Senior Mechanical EngineerFaade:Front, Marc Simmons, Principal, and Jeff Kim, Senior AssociateGeotechnical:Langan, Arthur Alzamora, Senior VP, and Mark Gallagher, Senior PrincipalCivil Engineer: Philip Habib & Associates, Philip Habib, PresidentSignage:2x4, Susan Sellers, Executive Creative Director, and Florian Mews, Design Director; T-Squared Design Studio, Inc., Trisia J. Tomanelli, President; Visual Graphic Systems (VGS), Lorraine Conte, Senior Account Executive.All renderings Bloom Images.> via New Museum