Client: Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)

Completion Date: October 2010

Program: A freestanding, 45,000-square foot single-story exhibition gallery for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Design Concept and Solution: Charged with adding expansive and flexible exhibition space to the museum's campus, the Renzo Piano team—who were responsible for the neighboring Broad Contemporary Art Museum, completed in 2008—designed an open-plan pavilion large enough to accommodate large-scale works or several separate exhibitions simultaneously. Like the Broad museum, the east and west walls are clad in pale travertine marble, while the all-glass north and south walls bring in light. On the exterior, curvy red forms in fiberglass conceal mechanical spaces (whose placement outside the building maximizes exhibition space) and refer back to the red accents of the Broad. The pavilion's sawtooth roof is fitted with skylights, which fill the one-story space with light. At night they emit a light of their own, sending a pale glow through the peaks of the roof.

Total construction cost: $53 million

Architect:
Renzo Piano Building Workshop
RPBW Inc.
827 Washington Street
New York, NY 10014
Phone: 212 400 2302
Fax: 212 400 2307