Designed by architect Thomas Phifer and Partners, the 100,000-square-foot North Wing addition includes a new 26,000-square-foot contemporary art gallery building, as well as one of the world’s largest facilities for glassblowing demonstrations and live glass design sessions. The addition will dramatically enhance the visitor experience for the Museum’s growing domestic and international audiences.

The design of the contemporary art gallery is a square, minimalist white glass building containing soaring, daylight-filled galleries. The facade is constructed with large, white glass panels that create a nearly seamless, softly reflective expanse. Inside, the gallery will feature a simple, white interior with massive curvilinear concrete walls. A special feature of the design is the custom precast concrete exposed ceiling beams. The beams add a level of simplistic elegance to the design of the building.

Béton Préfabriqué du Lac (BPDL) cast these beams vertically in order to get a perfect uniform finish on all three exposed sides. In total, BPDL produced 206 ceiling beams totalling 24,898 m2 of precast concrete. 

A sophisticated light-filtering system uses diffusing roof skylights combined with the precast concrete ceiling beams, providing the majority of the lighting required to view the art. The daylighting sets a new standard for how contemporary works in glass are displayed. A 150-foot-long window wall along the north side of the building will provide views of a new one-acre campus green, unifying the indoor and outdoor experience.

The building is part the museum’s expansion project and will serve as a hub for glass art enthusiasts for many years to come.