His work has already been approved by the management of the museum, now he has to agree with the city authorities. The nine-story laconic building will appear next to the famous 1966 Breuer building on Madison Avenue. The outer surfaces of the tower will be covered with panels of a silvery copper-aluminum alloy.
After the completion of construction, the area of the museum will be doubled. The entrance to the gallery will also change: Piano is going to demolish two existing apartment buildings in the neighborhood and replace them with a transparent glazed lobby and a small garden. From there, visitors will walk at the overhanging corner of the new building, entering the space of the new "junction" of the museum and café. At the same time, the transition from the narrow lobby to the spacious hall is played out, which will also be used for various social events.
Piano connected the new and old galleries with glass bridges built between two massive volumes.
The exhibition spaces in the new building will be quite traditional: spacious, hangar-like rooms. More original are the rooms on the upper floor, intended for temporary exhibitions: there the architect experiments with daylight, using perforated aluminum panels, complemented by a system of blinds.
The only caveat that can be made to the project is that it is not bold enough to withstand and complement Breuer's aggressive building.
