| Virginia Museum of Fine Arts | Projects: |
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1998 |
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M. Goodwin Associates and Randall Stout Architects were retained to provide a long-range strategic site and facility plan for VMFA. Due to the acquisition of several adjacent State properties on the museum block, the museum site could be viewed as a single campus for the first time in its history. The site plan is part of a comprehensive long-range plan to satisfy the museum’s growth through the next 20 years. The projected museum expansion of 132,000 square feet included a new lobby, cafe, gift shop, and temporary exhibition galleries as well as Asian and African permanent collection galleries. The service and art handling areas were also greatly expanded with new facilities for art storage, exhibition design, painting conservation and photography studio. Many other departments were relocated within the renovated existing spaces, bringing the total facility plan to 569,500 square feet. The existing facility, dating from 1935, never overcame its original design of multiple mezzanine, or half-floor levels within a single floor plane. This problematic concept resulted in a circuitous and difficult navigation plan throughout the entire building, with numerous ramps and stairs between seven levels rather than what should have been only four. Our expansion concept resulted in major circulation improvements and a commitment to growth only on the four most important levels, tripling the area of support space easily accessible to the dock. We also converted the gallery circulation pattern from a dead-end “T” configuration to a complete loop allowing visitors improved orientation and choices in gallery sequence. The building massing of our expansion diagram engages the urban garden and provides a new visibility of the main front entry, while creating welcoming, comfortable and dramatic spaces within the building. This master plan relocates surface parking lots away from the heart of the block to a peripheral 600-car garage and inserts sculpture gardens, fountains, an amphitheater, and new landscaping to create an urban oasis. The site concept plan also unifies and integrates neighboring buildings for the Virginia Historical Society, the Center for Education and Outreach, the Confederate Memorial Chapel, and the historic Robinson House. |
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts official site (This link will take you from the MGA site)
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©2005 M. Goodwin Associates, Inc. |