WHY Architecture | Broken Sidewalk

wHY Architecture Looks To Activate The Speed Museum

Grand Rapids Art Museum (courtesy wHY Architects)

On Friday, the Speed Museum announced the selection of wHY Architecture for the upcoming expansion of the museum. The Los Angeles, California based architects led by Kulapat Yantrasast, Yo Hakomori, and Richard Stoner, beat out seven other internationally renowned architects from around the world. The Museum originally planned to narrow the list to three last December, but found wHY Architecture to be the perfect match for the project. Plans call for the expansion project to start construction next year in 2010 with an anticipated grand opening in 2012. We spoke with Kulapat Yantrasast over the weekend to discern the firm’s design approach and philosophy and how it might impact the Speed Museum project.

The Speed Museum expansion presents a unique set of challenges that will require a creative solution. Situated on the edge of the University of Louisville’s Belknap Campus, the site is extremely constricted. The original 1927 Beaux-Arts museum designed by notable local architect Arthur Loomis has undergone a series of hodge-podge modern renovations over the years that have served to confuse the Museum’s functionality. The grand front doors have been sealed and the main entrance is situated in the rear of the building behind a low, nondescript glass door. The interior flow and circulation of the museum has also been compromised and overcrowding has forced interior spaces to mix use in inappropriate ways. Further, the Museum must negotiate the transition between the University campus setting, the city and street, and an Olmsted park.

Kulapat explained that museums across the world are stuck with modern additions that don’t enhance the original, historic structures. The temptation is to take the easy road and add on without relating back, effectively forming an architectural tumor. He hopes the new expansion will integrate the Museum into a single, cohesive whole. wHY Architects will not haphazardly tear down older additions, but adopts a self described “architectural acupuncture” that surgically inserts itself into its context. To accomplish this, the design team will study the critical areas of the museum including circulation and public space to create a unique solution for a 21st century museum.

“Museums around the world have become victim of their own growth, getting bigger, fatter and congestedly unhealthy,” said Yantrasast. “A museum’s growth should not mean merely adding new wings or new limbs to the old museum body. Museum expansion or development should be like acupuncture architecture; precise intervention or transformation strategically focused towards critical areas to regain the sense of clarity to the overall organization.”

Speed Art Museum (Official Site)
wHY Architects (Official Site)
Grand Rapids Art Museum (Official Site)
Speed Museum Shortlists Eight Architects For Addition (Broken Sidewalk)
wHY Yes! California firm to renovate & expand KY’s largest art museum (Architect’s Paper)
Speed Museum chooses wHY Architecture (WFPL)
Architects want to help Speed visitors find their way around (C-J)
Architects chosen for Speed Museum update (C-J)

Continue reading about the Speed Museum and wHY Architects.

Speed Museum Shortlists Eight Architects For Addition

Wednesday, October 8, 2008 by Broken Sidewalk.

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Speed Art Museum

The Courier-Journal reported this weekend that the Speed Museum has announced it has narrowed its list of architects down to eight for the design of a new addition to their facility on Third Street at the University of Louisville. A committee selected the eight architects from a pool of 100 contenders located around the globe. Firms on the shortlist represent a wide array of museum experience and architectural risk-taking; all eight are capable of designing a strong building that will serve as an icon for the city. Some, however, are more avante-garde and controversial than others. We say bring the controversy.

The museum’s director, Charles Venable, says a final selection is expected by the end of the year. Design work will begin shortly after as the winning architect will collaborate with a landscape designer and nearly 15 years of accumulated study of the Speed Museum site. The addition location on the cramped 2-acre site will be determined during this process and could potentially include locations adjacent to the School of Business, in front of Ekstrom Library, or even across Third Street via a walkway or tunnel. The University of Louisville wants the new museum’s landscape to play a central role in its relationship to the campus and city, responding to students passing by and creating an environmentally sustainable model. One of the architects on the shortlist is responsible for the only LEED Gold museum in the world.

The project is expected to serve as a new gateway onto the Belknap Campus near the location of the original Shipp Avenue entrance and provide an architectural standard to elevate the cultural prospects of the city overall. Charled Venable came to the Speed Museum just over a year ago from the Cleveland Institute of Art and had initially downplayed expansion plans in favor of attracting higher profile exhibits to the museum. He expected the expansion to be years in the future as the museum needed time to grow financially and culturally. The announcement of the shortlist suggests a momentum change that is sure to inspire interest in the Speed Museum’s future.

Venable has indicated that the current facility set-up at the Speed Museum leaves much room for improvement. Inadequate space for social functions has meant parties have been pushed into galleries, an outdated auditorium needs a complete overhaul, and the main entrance to the museum is tucked inconspicuously behind an addition, leaving the Speed’s original brass front doors locked. The Speed Museum’s board had considered several years ago a potential downtown location as a sort of modern art wing of the museum, but opted in 2005 to focus expansion at its current site, determining coordination and cost would interfere with the museum’s mission.

The cost of the addition has not yet been determined and the Speed Museum expects to settle on a number when working with the architect, but with the caliber of design the museum is after, the final cost is sure to be high. In 2005, a master plan determined the addition might cost $150 million, but that figure is surely significantly lower than the expected new addition.

Broken Sidewalk will be profiling each of the eight shortlisted architectural firms over the next couple weeks to uncover what each office brings to the design table. In the meantime, here’s the list of architects who made the Speed Museum’s short list.