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Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Delaware Park Addition

This conceptual design for a 42,000-square-foot addition to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery preserves the integrity of the great binary composition of Edward B. Green’s 1906 Greek Revival building and Gordon Bunshaft’s 1963 modern addition, by placing a third component, the addition, on the site’s secondary east-west axis, creating a tripartite solution that achieves a dynamic balance while respecting the primary north-south axis of the existing composition. This new expansion would allow the Museum to open outward to its immediate grounds, the neighboring Delaware Park, and Hoyt Lake.

Perpendicular to the existing museum complex, the new addition includes exhibition, administration, education, event, and public spaces, as well as an auditorium and the main entry. Our design creates an additional 20,000 square feet of sky-lit exhibition space at the Museum’s main level, linked with the existing exhibition space via a new glass galleria. The existing sculpture garden is enclosed within a flat glass dome to form a new lobby and event space. A new observation gallery is created overlooking Hoyt lake, surmounting the relocated cafe and new terrace on the lower level.

The museum’s entry sequence will be clarified and expanded, maintaining Bunshaft’s Entry as the Museum’s main entrance, while leading visitors along a new, more generous introductory path through the transformed sculpture courtyard before they move into the rest of the museum. Our design also proposes a 46,500-square-foot subterranean parking garage that includes a sky-lit stair which ascends to the Entry Lobby.