Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
The Broad, a contemporary art museum designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, is due to open on September 20th in Los Angeles, California.
Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
The designer’s description
Dubbed ‘the veil and the vault’, the museum’s design merges the two key programs of the building: public exhibition space and the archive/storage that will support The Broad Art Foundation’s lending activities.
Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
Rather than relegate the archive/storage to secondary status, ‘the vault’ plays a key role in shaping the museum experience from entry to exit. Its heavy opaque mass is always in view, hovering midmay in the building. Its carved underside shapes the lobby below and public circulation routes. Its top surface is the floor of the exhibition space.
Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
The vault is enveloped on all sides by the ‘veil’, and airy, cellular exoskeleton structure that spans across the block-long gallery and provides filtered natural daylight.
Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
The museum’s ‘veil’ lifts at the corners, welcoming the visitors into an active lobby with a bookshop and espresso bar. The public is then drawn upwards via escalator, tunneling through the archive, arriving onto an acre of column-free exhibition space bathed in diffused light.
Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Broad and Diller Scofidio + Renfro
This 24′ high space is fully flexible to be shaped into galleries according to curatorial needs. Departure from the exhibition space is a return trip through the vault via a winding stair that offers glimpses into the vast holdings of the collection.
