1/07/2011

Diller + Scofidio and Renfro unveil the Broad Museum

New York-based Diller, Scofidio and Renfro (DSR) unveiled the Broad Museum, yesterday Thursday 6th. This will be one of the major developments for Los Angeles according to observers.
This 105,90.6 square-meter (114,000 square-foot) museum's design appears to be simple. It is in line with DSR's past works. DSR, like Asymptote Architecture and Iwamoto Scott, like technology and digital media as their installations and architectural projects have shown. This interest mirrors the Broad Museum's design proposal.
The Broad Museum — Render, Diller, Scofidio and Renfro, Los Angeles, United States of America, © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro. Originally appeared on LA Times.

The building is articulated into two large rectangular boxes. The first one concerns the parking garage at the base and above that an interior space for storage, archives and office space for the Broad Art Foundation.
The ceiling of the parking garage, as Architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne of LA Times says, doubles as the floor of the lobby in much the same way that the top of the storage box becomes the floor of the galleries. The upper box, which is considered as "the vault", is wrapped with gallery space above it and the lobby situated at ground level, by the precast skin, known as the "veil".
The Broad Museum, Diller, Scofidio and Renfro, Los Angeles, USA, © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro. Originally appeared on Architizer

The "veil" will play a key structural in the construction as it will bear the roof load and make possible the column-less gallery space on the top floor. This veil will be thick and transparent but its thickness and transparency, as Hawthorne notes, will be different on each façade. Two places will feature a rupture in its surface. Elizabeth Diller calls a "dimple" this deformation taking the shape of a concave window. This will overlook the avenue and frame a large conference room.

Seattle Public Library, OMA, Seattle, USA, © OMA
CCTV, OMA, Beijing, China, © OMA
Crown Hall at ITT, Mies van der Rohe, Illinois, USA, © Mies van der Rohe
Crown Hall at IIT, Ludwig Mies vand er Rohe, Illinois, USA, © Mies van der Rohe

To a certain extent, this museum's plan reminds OMA's load-bearing façades, in particular Seattle Public Library and Beijing CCTV.
But, as Kesley Campbell-Dollaghan writes for Architizer, the plan seems Miesian, too, specially this column-free plane which was a theme in Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's work, precisely the Crown Hall at IIT since Mies used four massive steel girders to hang the entire roof above the ground podium.
Broad Museum, Diller, Scofidio and Renfro, Los Angeles, USA, © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro. Originally appeared on Architizer.

This museum will be connected to the urban fabric. A new train station, located in Hope and 2nd Streets, is planned to be built by then end of the decade. The idea is that this new L-shaped plaza aims at offering a direct connection between the transit system and the museum and the rest of Grand Avenue's cultural institution. 
Broad Museum, Diller, Scofidio and Renfro, Los Angeles, USA, © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro. Originally appeared on Architizer.
The spatial organisation is a reminiscent of that of Mies' Crown Hall

This building's plan is organised in three levels. It shows that the building will have two entrances/ Visitor will enter the museum through one of these two entrances: either at Grand and 2nd Street, which is near Disney Hall, or at Grand toward 3rd, directly across the avenue from the Colburn School and the Museum of Contemporary Art.
Crown Hall at IIT, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Illinois, USA, © Mies van der Rohe

The project has some issues that must be solved before construction scheduled to begin this summer, such as the circulation glitch that, Hawthorne noted, even Elizabeth Diller admits will have to be smoothed out or changed entirely.
Broad Museum, Diller, Scofidio and Renfro, Los Angeles, USA, © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro. Originally appeared on Architizer.

The construction on the museum is scheduled to begin this summer and is expected to be completed in 2013.

Project Data
Project: Broad Museum
Programme: Museum
Architect: Diller, Scofidio and Renfro (DSR)
Location: Los Angeles, USA
Size: 105,90.6 square meter (114,000 square foot)
Construction start: 2011
Completion year expected: 2013
Cost: $130 millions

Credits
Renderings of the Broad Museum all courtesy © Diller, Scofidio and Renfro
Source: LA Times of January 6th and Architizer

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