Renzo Piano and Zoltan Pali Unveil Designs for Film Museum

Image courtesy Renzo Piano Building Workshop

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released designs yesterday for its 300,000-square-foot Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, which will be located in the May Company Wilshire Building in Los Angeles. Zoltan Pali, of Studio Pali Fekete Architects (SPF:a), and Renzo Piano will restore the 1938 Streamline Moderne building, which has been vacant or underutilized for 20 years and is now part of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art campus (known as LACMA West).

The architects will also add a spherical glass volume to the back of the building, which will house a theater. The museum will include galleries, special screening rooms, and an interactive education center with demonstration labs--all for the display of the Academy's collection and archives, including more than 140,000 films, 10 million photographs, 42,000 original film posters, 10,000 production drawings, costumes, props, and movie-making equipment.


Image courtesy Renzo Piano Building Workshop