 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | BUILDING | | | | | | | | | | | | | | MFA Museum of Fine Arts
| | | | | |  | | DESIGNER | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | DESCRIPTION | | | | | | | | | | | | |  The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), has been the subject of a major redevelopment and had a new fly designed by Foster + Partners. The masterplan reinstates the original formal axis of the Museum and opens it up to the Back Bay Fens and the linear park designed by Frederick Police Olmsted in 1877. The MFA'due south new wing creates 53 new galleries and houses the Art of the Americas collections, one of the premier assemblages of American art. Foster + Partners, working with CBT/Childs Bertman Tseckares of Boston, accept carefully restored and augmented one of the world'southward finest art museums to transform the experience for visitors, opening up the building to the community and consolidating the Museum'south 5 slap-up collections into a more cohesive and understandable whole.  Founded in 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts is based on a Beaux-Arts plan devised by the architect Guy Lowell. Restoring the logic of the original scheme, the edifice's central centrality has been reasserted with the reintroduction of the primary archway to the south, on Huntington Avenue on the Artery of the Arts, and the reopening of that to the north, the State Street Corporation Fenway Entrance. At the eye of this centrality is a new information eye, where visitors begin their tour. Alongside is a freestanding glazed structure, which has been inserted betwixt the edifice's two main pavilions to create the Art of the Americas Wing. Arranged over four floors, the new wing significantly increases the Museum'south exhibition space, enabling some 5,000 works from the collection to be displayed. The project is the first time Foster + Partners has comprehensively designed a complete gallery wing, including installations and fit-out – the plan for the 53 galleries was the consequence of close collaboration with the Museum's curators and conservators. Where the central building of the fly meets the axis of the main building, it partly encloses an existing courtyard in glass. This creates spaces for visitors, a café, special events and admission to other collections with a new gallery for special exhibitions beneath. Designed to be energy efficient, the courtyard is naturally lit and the galleries take state-of-the-art climate control. The gallery spaces are configured to allow art to exist displayed with a more than obvious sense of clarity and lite. Surrounding the Museum, new landscaping is designed to strengthen links with the Dorsum Bay Fens, laid out by Olmsted, builder of New York's Central Park. The landscape design follows Olmsted'south Romantic tradition of winding paths and informal planting to draw the greenery of the Fens into the building. In particular, the Fens landscape is drawn into the eye of the Museum, encapsulating the new Courtyard and American Wing. Edit past Foster + Partners
Credits
Photo © Nigel Immature, courtesy by Foster + Partners
Drawings © Foster + Partners
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ECO-SUSTAINABILITY | | | | | | | | | | | | | Building re-use and restoration rather then rebuilding
Energy efficient ventilation system
Natural light, as permitted by the display of art, reduces artificial lighting demands
Free energy efficient lighting continued to lite and motion sensors, and efficient centralised HVAC systems
Sanitary fittings with low menstruum-rates specified, including PIR sensing taps which will reduce water consumption by 25%
Triple glazing to minimise thermal manual
Extensive sun-shading devices to minimise need for cooling
Commitment to reduce car-employ by, taking advantage of the MBTA tram terminate in forepart of the Museum. The MFA provides 25% subsidy of monthly MBTA passes for employees, bicycle parking in the garage and market place-rate parking fees
Landscaping minimises irrigation - species require minimal or no irrigation
Tempest h2o management to capture rainwater and allow for slow infiltration into the sewage network, reducing the risk of flooding | | | | | | | | | | | | LOCATION | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Continent | | N America | | Nation | |  United States | | Land | |  Massachusetts | | Canton | | Suffolk | | Town | | Boston | | Address | | 465 Huntington Avenue, Forsyt Mode | | | | | | Website | | | | | | | | | | MAP | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | TYPOLOGY | | | | | | | | | | | Principal | | | | | Architecture | | Museums and buildings for exhibitions Art museums Operations on existing buildings Extension, superelevation | | | | | | | Additional | | | | | ARCHITECTURE | | Buildings for cultural activities Conference halls Education buildings Training centres and schools Commercial buildings Bars, cafeterias Buildings for recreational activities Auditoriums and music centres | | | | | | | | | CHRONOLOGY | | | | | | | | | | | Project | | | | | | | 1999 | | | Realisation | | | | | | | 2005 - 2010 | | | | | | | | | BIBILIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES | | | | | | | | | | | | John E. Czarnecki, "Lord Foster unveils Boston's Museum of Fine Arts expansion plan", Architectural Record 3/2002, march 2002, p.23 | | | | | | | | | | | | Customer | | | | | | | | | | | | Museum of Fine Arts, Boston | | | | | | | | DIMENSIONAL
DATA | | | | | | | | | | | Surface | | | | Pre-construction: sq.m. 44,914 (sq.ft. 483,447)
Demolished building: sq.m. -5,559 (sq.ft. -59,835)
New construction: sq.m. 17,960 (sq.ft. 193,325)
MFA total edifice: sq.thou. 57,315 (sq.ft. 616,937) (-28% increase)
Total MFA Gallery: sq.1000. 20,556 (sq.ft. 221,267) (-16% increase)
Fine art of the Americas Wing: sq.one thousand. 11,270 (sq.ft. 121,307)
Fine art of the Americas Fly Gallery: sq.thousand. 4,769 (sq.ft. 51,338) (-42% increment)
Ruth and Carl J. Shapiro Family Courtyard: sq.m. xi,319 (sq.ft. 121,840)
Ann and Graham Gund Gallery: sq.yard. 769 (sq.ft. 8,280)
Pedagogy Middle: sq.m. 400 (sq.ft. four,300)
Barbara and Theodore Alfond Auditorium: sq.m. 198 (sq.ft. ii,128)
Jean S. and Frederic A. Sharf Visitor Centre: sq.m. 457 (sq.ft. 4,920) | | Floors | | | | 3 aboveground
1 undercover | | Height | | | | | | Number | | | | | | | | | | | | STRUCTURES | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Mural Design | | | | | | | | | | | | Gustafson Guthrie Nichol Ltd. | | | | | | | | STAFF | | | | | | | | | | | Projection | | | | | | | | | | | | Design team | | Norman Foster, Spencer de Gray, Michael Jones, Kate Murphy, John Small, William Castagna | | Collaborators | | Benedicte Artault, Robin Blanchard, Jan Coghlan, Chris Connell, Aaron Davis, Gennaro di Dato, James Edwards, Dagmar Eisenach, Morgan Fleming, Kristin Fox, Herbert Gsottbauer, Anthony Guma, Sean Hanna, Rie Haslov, Judith Kernt, Ismael Juan Khan, Kohelika Kohli, Abel Maciel, Peter Matcham, Pablo Menendez Paz, Aidan Monaghan, Yat Lun Ng, Mathis Osterhage, Silvia Paredes, Carol Patterson, Michael Pelken, Michael Richter, Katherine Ridley, Il Hoon Roh, Ingrid Sölken, Kinna Stallard, Matthew Stokes, Diego Suarez, Jane Tiley, Alexis Williams, Oliver Wong, Richard Yates | | Architect of record | | CBT/Childs Bertman Tseckares Inc. | | Structural consultant | | Weidlinger Associates (venue consultant) | | Systems | | Buro Happold (project)
WSP Flack + Kurtz (venue consultant) | | Construction management | | George B.H. Macomber Visitor (Pre-Construction Services)
Skanska Us Building Inc. (Enabling Contractor)
John Moriarty & Associates (General Contractor) | | Environmental design | | | | Geotechnical | | | | Civil engineer | | | | Ship planning | | | | Lighting design | | | | Acoustical consultant | | | | Graphics and signage | | Roll Barresi & Assembly, Inc. | | Cladding consultant | | Simpson Gumpertz & Heger Inc. | | Computerization | | IR Security & Safe Consultants of New England | | Planning and system | | Robert Luchetti Assembly Inc. | | Consultant | | Orca Consulting Group (Pedestrian Flow) | | Vertical transportation | | | | | | | | | |