The new Miami Art Museum (MAM) will be an anchor of the 29-acre Museum Park overlooking Biscayne Bay and will include public gardens and sculpture installations. Museum Park is Miami's urban redesign vision for the area now known as Bicentennial Park. This vital downtown park, a catalyst for the transformation of the district, is central to efforts to strengthen Greater Miami’s momentum as an emerging global capital. A vibrant mix of green space and cultural offerings, in addition to landmark new facilities for MAM, the Park will also be the site of the future home of the Miami Science Museum, as well as a branch of the Historical Museum of Southern Florida.
The New Miami Art Museum Designed by Herzog & de Meuron, the new Miami Art Museum will offer 200,000 square feet of programmable space, including 120,000 square feet of interior space - more than three times the size of the Museum’s current facility. It will also include approximately 80,000 square feet of exterior program space for the display of works of art, educational activities, relaxation and dining. This expansion will provide room for larger and more varied displays of the Museum’s collection and special exhibitions. The building will also house an educational complex with a library, auditorium, classrooms, and workshop space; and a café and store. The new design will stimulate and support collection growth and enable MAM to better fulfill its role as an educational resource for the city and beyond.
Herzog & de Meuron’s design for the new Miami Art Museum is highly responsive to Miami’s climate and the needs of a young, rising art museum. The three-story building will sit upon an elevated platform and below a canopy, both of which will extend far beyond the Museum’s walls, creating a shaded veranda and plazas. Working with local and international landscape designers and horticulturists, the architects will use this space to “bring the park into the museum” in new and innovative ways.
The interior of the Museum will comprise a series of distinct galleries and other public areas connected by a series of interstitial spaces displaying the permanent collection, allowing for a fluid visitor experience. Transparency on the first and third levels of the galleries will reveal the public and semi-public functions within: the entry halls, auditorium, shop and café on the first level and the education center and staff offices on the third. An open-air parking garage will be located beneath the Museum and surrounded by landscaping and terraces.
The permanent collection galleries will be located on the first and, principally, the second level, which will also house extensive temporary exhibition galleries. While mainly oriented inward so as to focus on the art, the second floor galleries will incorporate carefully placed windows to allow for natural light and views of the surrounding park and bay. The main gallery level of the new museum will appear to hover between more transparent levels, all of which will be shaded by the canopy above.
The canopy’s overhang will create a series of outdoor spaces that bridge the museum, park, and city. The canopy will be perforated to allow in light, and lush vegetation will literally be built into the columns, transforming the veranda into a multi-dimensional garden. The tropical plants enfolding the museum will be integral to the museum’s structural system. The microclimate of the areas under the canopy will be regulated through geothermal cooling of the exterior surfaces and by the canopy itself, one of the many “green” strategies being explored for the new museum. The design allows for multiple transitions, as visitors gradually move from the outside to the inside, hot to cold, humid to dry, and from the street or park to the art. A set of stairs the width of the Museum will link the building to the bay walk in Museum Park. Local natural resources, such as ground temperature, the wind, rain and the solar power, will be used to further reduce the building’s energy needs and environmental footprint.
In recognition of MAM’s role as an emerging and rapidly growing art museum, the architects have designed a building which can expand organically from within without major disruptions. As MAM’s collection continues to grow, additional walls and rooms can be added within the fluid interior volumes. In addition, discrete gallery expansions can be made, at a later date, without interruption of the Museum’s daily activities. Various options for a larger 25,000 square foot expansion with the museum’s site have also been explored in the need for future growth.
Funding
The people of Miami-Dade have approved $100 million in bonds towards the $220 million projected budget and the Museum is in the midst of a capital campaign to raise the balance.
