New Museum Expansion | OMA - Office for Metropolitan Architecture

Architectural Fact Sheet
The New Museum is constructing a major building expansion designed by OMA / Shohei Shigematsu and Rem Koolhaas in partnership with Cooper Robertson, Executive Architect. Complementing and expanding on the New Museum’s existing SANAA-designed flagship building at 235 Bowery, the 61,930 square foot, OMA-designed expansion will be seven stories tall, including three floors of exhibition galleries that seamlessly connect to the Museum’s existing galleries—doubling the Museum’s exhibition space.

Building Features

• Doubled Exhibition Space: The building expansion will double the New Museum’s exhibition space by adding a total of 9,600 sf. The new building’s galleries will connect to the SANAA building’s galleries on three levels (second, third, and fourth floors), with the ceiling heights aligning on each floor. Each of the new galleries will be able to function as a distinct gallery or seamlessly connect to the existing galleries, creating much needed space for exhibitions with high flexibility and horizontal flow between the buildings.

• Enhanced Visitor Experience and Amenities: The expansion will dramatically improve vertical circulation at the New Museum with the addition of an Atrium Stair offering dramatic views of the surrounding neighborhood and down Prince Street. as well as three new elevators, two of which are dedicated to the combined gallery spaces. The new building will provide additional public spaces and services, including an expanded museum lobby that spans the two buildings, a larger bookstore, a Forum spanning the 6th and 7th floors, an expansion of the existing 7th floor Sky Room, and a new full-service restaurant, while also providing space for a more efficient organization of back of house, storage, and offices. The building will feature a solar energy generating photovoltaic roof as well as three new upper floor terraces with expansive views of lower Manhattan.

• Dedicated Space for New Museum Initiatives: The expanded building will provide the first purpose-built home for the New Museum’s cultural incubator NEW INC, as well as space for the New Museum’s digital media affiliate Rhizome, while providing both with more public visibility. With a dedicated workspace and production facilities for NEW INC, the New Museum’s expanded building will help incubate emergent creative practitioners who are defining new ways of working with technology. The expansion will also create a new, dedicated artist studio space, supporting both local and international artists in the creation and presentation of new work.

• Flexible Platforms for Educational Programming: As intimate conversations, hands-on workshops, and professional development seminars have become increasingly important forms of public engagement at the New Museum and beyond, the new building will have spaces on the 5th, 6th, and 7th floors specifically designed to more regularly conduct and present innovative educational programs to meet the community’s changing needs.

• Innovative Use of Materials: The new building's façade uses laminated glass with a metal mesh interlayer—a material that recalls and complements the SANAA building façade yet allows for a higher degree of transparency. In daylight, the material will establish a simple, unified exterior for the two buildings. In the evening, the OMA-designed building will become more transparent, communicating the activities of the New Museum outwards while creating a more inviting presence drawing the public inwards

Design Architects: OMA, Shohei Shigematsu, Partner in Charge; Rem Koolhaas, Partner in Collaboration; Jake Forster, Associate/Project Architect; Jackie Woon Bae, Design Lead; Ninoslav Krgovic, Technical Lead

Architect of Record: Cooper Robertson, Erin Flynn, Partner; Andrew Barwick, Senior Associate

Project Team

New Museum Building Project Coordinator: New Museum, Dennis Szakacs, Chief Operating Officer

Project 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 & COO

Construction Manager: F.J. Sciame Construction, Co., Inc, Joseph Mizzi, President and Chief Operating Services Officer, Steven Colletta, Senior Vice President, Thomas Sevchuk, Vice President

Structural Engineer: ARUP, Matt Jackson, Principal, and Christopher Adams, Senior

Structural Engineer Mechanical Systems: ARUP, Matt Jackson, Principal, and Neil Muir, Senior Mechanical Engineer

Façade: Front, Marc Simmons, Principal, and Jeff Kim, Senior Associate

Geotechnical: Langan, Arthur Alzamora, Senior VP, and Mark Gallagher, Senior Principal

Civil Engineer: Philip Habib & Associates, Philip Habib, President

Signage: 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