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.
Herzog & de Meuron
Based in Basel, Switzerland, Herzog & de Meuron is known for designs that are at once highly inventive and sensitive to the site, geography, and culture of the region for which the building is planned. Among their critically acclaimed museum projects are the de Young Museum, in San Francisco (2005); the expansion of the Walker Art Center, in Minneapolis (2005); Schaulager for the Laurenz Foundation, in Basel (2003); and the conversion of a power plant into Tate Modern, in London (2000), as well as the new development for Transforming Tate Modern (projected completion in 2012). Among its many other widely-recognized projects is the “Bird’s Nest” Beijing National Stadium, site of the 2008 Olympics. For their distinguished accomplishments, Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron were awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2001.
Together with Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, Christine Binswanger is partner-in-charge of the new Miami Art Museum. She has been a partner in the firm of Herzog & de Meuron since 1994 and also led the expansion of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis (2005) and IKMZ BTU Cottbus, Information, Communications and Media Center, Brandenburg Technical University, Cottbus, Germany (2004), among other projects.
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.
Project Consultants
A.D.A. Engineering, Miami, FL, as civil engineers
Arquitectonica Geo, Miami, FL, as landscape architects Arquitectonica Geo will also be involved in the architectural design related to the plaza between MAM and the Science Museum, the shared parking structure and other aspects of the building.
ARUP Engineers, New York, NY, as the project’s lead mechanical engineers and as the structural engineers
Balfour Beatty Construction, Coral Gables, FL, as preconstruction consultants
Cermak Peterka Petersen, Fort Collins, CO, as wind engineering consultants
ConsultEcon, Cambridge, MA, as business planner
Douglas Wood and Associates of Coral Gables, FL., as structural engineering subcontractors
EE&G, Miami Lakes, FL, as environmental consultants
FRONT, New York, NY, as curtain wall consultants
Handel Architects, New York, NY, as executive architects
Harvey Marshall Berling Associates, New York, NY, as acoustical and audiovisual consultants
JALRW Engineering, Miami, FL, as mechanical engineering subcontractors
JGL Management, Princeton, NJ, as restaurant consultants
Kaderabek Company, Miami, FL, as geotechnical consultants
Laura Llerena Associates, Miami, FL, as landscape architect subcontractors
Layne Consultants International, Denver, CO as security consultants
Miller Legg Associates, Miami, FL, as surveyors
Paratus Group, New York, NY, as project director
Patrick Blanc, Paris, France, as vertical gardens consultant
Schirmer Engineering, North Miami Beach, FL, as code consultants
Stuart-Lynn Company, New York, NY, as cost estimators
Tim Haahs & Associates, Miami, FL, as parking consultants
Transsolar Energietechnik, Stuttgart, Germany, as energy use consultants
Miami Art Museum in Museum Park Chronology
October 2009: Herzog & de Meuron complete design development of the new Miami Art Museum at Museum Park.
October 2009: MAM’s Major Use Special Permit comes before the full commission October 22, 2009.
May 2009: The Commissioners of the City of Miami approve three resolutions that allow the construction of the Miami Art Museum and Miami Science Museum’s new facilities to begin as part of the Museum Park Miami project.
December 2008: The Commissioners of the City of Miami unanimously approve the lease for the land and the Museum Benefits Agreement.
April and May 2008: The Miami-Dade County and City of Miami Commissions approve the memorandum of understanding which outlines the responsibilities among all of the parties involved in the implementation of Museum Park.
November 2007: MAM unveils the design concepts for its new home in downtown Miami in Work in Progress: Herzog & de Meuron’s Miami Art Museum
September 2006: At a public meeting, the Miami Art Museum selects the internationally renowned Swiss firm of Herzog & de Meuron to design its new building in Museum Park.
April 2005: The City of Miami initiates the Park’s master-planning process with Cooper, Robertson & Partners.
January 2005: MAM begins work with the Paratus Group of New York, project management specialists, and by year’s end completes a comprehensive draft of the functional building program for its new facility.
November 2004: Miami-Dade County electorate passes the Building Better Communities Bond Program, which provides funds to construct and improve cultural and educational facilities, including Museum Park. Passed by an overwhelming 65 percent majority, the cultural and educational component of the historic Building Better Communities bond program promised to be an important initiative for generations to come.
May 2004: Following an international call for qualifications, the City of Miami’s blue-ribbon committee selects the New York firm Cooper, Robertson & Partners as master planners for Museum Park.
July 2002: The City of Miami unanimously adopts a resolution designating Museum Park Miami at Bicentennial Park as its official urban design vision for the future of this underutilized park. Four acres are designated for MAM’s building footprint. Equal acreage is dedicated to Miami Science Museum.
November 2001: The City of Miami voters approve, by an unprecedented 57 percent majority, a Bond Issue in support of efforts by Miami Art Museum and Miami Science Museum for Museum Park.
July 2000–May 2001: The City of Miami conducts a comprehensive public process to determine the future of Bicentennial Park. By an overwhelming majority, citizens participating in the process select the Museum Park vision for this underused waterfront land.
1996–1999: With nearly $1 million in private support, MAM assembles a national team of experts and maps out the Museum’s growth in the twenty-first century.
1995: During a community-wide planning process, the public establishes the creation of a new building and a sculpture garden as a key goal for MAM.
