Berkeley's New Art Museum

After a 1997 survey that found that the University of Berkeley Museum's existing concrete structure did not meet seismic standards, the project to create a new visual arts facility and retrofit the museum was developed. Toyo Ito's conceptual proposal, which when built will be his first United States project, was recently chosen by the university.

This new and ambitious plan seeks to enlarge the current building by nearly 40% with the new structure conceived as a simple three story box with each level divided into sixteen squares. The first floor will house two theatres, five exhibition galleries, a museum store and other visitor's facilities and attractions.

The curvilinear structure, located in an area where the UC Berkeley campus meets the city, at the northwest corner of Oxford and Center Streets seeks to give the city of Berkeley a landmark building. The new museum will also be close to the Bart Rail system, the Berkeley Repertory theater, the Jazz school and the Aurora Theater company.

The building design reflects Ito's ideas on creating grids that "erode" to generate more fluid forms on the exterior, making for more dynamic street level interaction. Also, the gallery walls will be designed to move between exhibition areas to allow for more exploration of the spaces which all offer different activities. The museum is set to open mid 2013.

Though still in its conceptual form, I think this project will be a very dynamic structure for the university, the city of Berkeley and the entire Bay Area. Frank Ghery should take a look at this and see how university buildings can be designed with "out of the box" thinking that does not translate to creating ridiculous ensembles of materials and shapes that neither relate to each other nor the site.


Images obtained from www.arcspace.com/architects/ito/bam