Archinect - News

SOM completes restoration of Lever House, a midcentury Manhattan office icon

2023-11-17T15:14:00-05:00

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill has announced the completion of a recent restoration project that’s meant to breathe new life into their historic Lever House design in Manhattan.

The scope of their work entailed the creation of a new lobby, ground-level public plaza, installation of an entirely new modernized building system, and 15,000-square-foot Lever Club hospitality suite in addition to redesigned interior spaces from Marmol Radziner.

Image: Lucas Blair Simpson © SOM

The brief called for repairs affecting the material character of the building (terrazzo flooring, refinished exterior columns, and a glass mosaic tile wall) and fixes to water-damaged ceilings. Reed Hilderbrand has also contributed a comprehensive new landscape program for the building that connects the plaza area to third-floor terraces. Costs for the project were around $100 million.

Image: Lucas Blair Simpson © SOM

“This renovation brings Lever House into the 21st century,” SOM Partner Chris Cooper said in a statement...

Selldorf will join SOM for the Hirshhorn Museum's vital third revitalization phase

2022-10-31T18:03:00-04:00

Washington, D.C.’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden has announced that a joint team of SOM and Selldorf Architects will lead a major modernization of its now 48-year-old Gordon Bunshaft-designed facility in the last of a three-phase campus revitalization that will begin in 2025, according to the Washington Post.

The upgrades will cover the interior and plaza area and are being undertaken in order to help the museum adjust to a 40% rise in attendance that has been recorded since 2017.

The project will address important areas such as storage, stormwater management, accessibility, vertical transportation, and other upgrades to its galleries and public areas to correspond with the museum’s needs. In a press statement, Selldorf co-principal Chris Cooper said: “Ensuring that the building is better able to accommodate the museum’s ambitious programs, while serving a larger and more diverse audience, is of critical importance. And we need to be able to do so while making the building ...

D.C.'s Hirshhorn Museum gets the final go-ahead from the National Capital Planning Commission

2021-12-06T13:32:00-05:00

The end is finally here for the saga surrounding artist Hiroshi Sugimoto's reworking of the Washington, D.C. Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden following an approval Thursday from the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC).

The NCPC go-ahead comes after another round of discord which began in March when Sugimoto allegedly threatened to quit the project over an amended plan which would have cut out his introduction of a stacked stone wall in Gordon Bunshaft’s original centerpiece water feature in the museum’s sculpture garden.

Image courtesy of Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

The July proposal itself came with a bit of controversy as opponents of the plan were quick to point out that the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, which governs any new Smithsonian development, was replete of any landscape architects as recently appointed by President Joe Biden.

“The art of our time is often immersive, interactive and ready to break free of walls, and we believe that a museum of the ...

Hiroshi Sugimoto's redesign of the Hirshhorn Museum sculpture garden is finally approved by the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts

2021-07-19T12:34:00-04:00

The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts has approved plans for artist and architect Hiroshi Sugimoto's redesign of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C.

This vote clears way for the Smithsonian to go to the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) for their final approval. The NCPC previously gave preliminary approvals alongside the CFA in the spring of 2019.

Images courtesy of Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.

The plan had previously come under fire after the Cultural Landscape Foundation, a group that advocates the interests of historic landscape sites around the country, protested, claiming the artist's vision would harm original elements of the Hirshhorn campus designed by Pritzker Prize winner Gordon Bunshaft.

Images courtesy of Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.

The museum has held a line against the protests, claiming that Bunshaft and landscape designer Lester Collins had both looked to Japanese gardens as inspir...

Hirshhorn Museum: sculpture garden revitalization remains contested

2021-01-13T14:20:00-05:00

Facing challenges from a federal planning authority and advocacy groups, the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, DC is under pressure to revamp or justify elements of a significant redesign of its sunken sculpture garden.

The heated debate over Hiroshi Sugimoto's plans to revitalize the sunken sculpture garden at the Hirshhorn Museum, completed in 1974 by Gordon Bunshaft, is dragging on.

"At an online meeting on 3 December, the federal National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) approved Sugimoto’s preliminary site development plans with the exception of the proposed changes to the reflecting pool and inner partition wall," reports The Art Newspaper.

Previously on Archinect: Advocates ready for battle over Hirshhorn Museum garden 'revitalization'

"Commissioners asked that the Hirshhorn explore an alternative to the expanded pool design that would retain the historic dimensions of the existing one. It also recommended that the Smithsonian find a way to make the new stacked stone walls more compatible with, while still distinct from, the material that Bunshaft used for his historic perimeter wall."

Meanwhile next door, the Smithsonian just scaled back elements inside the BIG-designed $2 billion Smith...

Advocates ready for battle over Hirshhorn Museum garden "revitalization"

2020-07-17T14:02:00-04:00

Advocates for the preservation of modernist landscapes in Washington have taken on another fight. After beating back the National Geographic Society’s plan to demolish “Marabar,” the 1984 sculptural installation by Elyn Zimmerman on its campus, they are now battling the Hirshhorn Museum’s proposal to redo its sunken sculpture garden by the architect Gordon Bunshaft and the landscape architect Lester Collins.

As the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. gears up to restore its existing Gordon Bunshaft-designed facilities, landscape preservation advocates have voiced concerns over parallel plans to alter and reconfigure a series of Lester Collins-designed gardens that surround the iconic circular structure. A renovation plan led by architect Hiroshi Sugimoto aims to completely reconfigure the garden areas that front the museum.

Speaking with The New York Times, Charles Birnbaum of The Cultural Landscape Foundation asks, “Why are we applying a different set of standards to the landscape architecture than to the building architecture? We should have the same goals.”

Clashing Over a NYC Modernist Landmark

2011-09-29T13:50:44-04:00

The building’s exterior was made a landmark in 1997. The interior, which had come to public attention after a signature metal screen by the sculptor Harry Bertoia was removed, was not given landmark status until February. Two months after the interior landmark designation, the commission granted the new owner, Vornado, permission to make changes to the building.

Designed by Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill the former Manufacturers, the former Hanover Trust building located at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 43rd Street, is considered a Modernist landmark. Robin Pogrebin examines the ongoing court battle between preservationists and the city over the buildings future. The fight centers around proposed changes to the interior of the building, which preservationists argue would significantly alter the view of the building from the street. The current owners Vornado Realty Trust contend however, that they have already made changes in order to protect the buildings landmark status and furthermore suggest that adaptability for future uses was a key part of the original design.