POSTCARD FROM LOS ANGELES

Dear ArchitectureWeek,

I recently ventured to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) to see the new Resnick Pavilion designed by Renzo Piano. As I approached the pavilion from Wilshire Boulevard, I was impressed by how impeccably it seems to mimic the adjacent Broad Contemporary Art Museum (BCAM), another recent LACMA building by Piano. Both structures are clad in travertine slabs, both sport fanlike roofs to allow daylight into the galleries, both are accented with bright red exterior elements — staircases on BCAM and sculptural HVAC equipment on the Resnick Pavilion — and yet the two buildings manifest entirely different takes on museum typology.

MANHATTAN TOWNHOUSE

Having a strong appreciation for the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Edgar and Clarissa Bronfman commissioned the firm of Peter Rose to design the gut renovation of a Manhattan townhouse in order to create a home with the appropriate atmosphere for their significant art collection.

WYLY THEATRE BY REX AND OMA

The first thing that strikes a visitor to the new Dee and Charles Wyly Theatre in Dallas, Texas, is that the building doesn't look like a theater at all. It's a basic box elongated upward. The typical theater configuration, with an auditorium surrounded by a public lobby and back-of-house support spaces, has been completely reshuffled by architects REX and OMA into a vertical stack.

More Architecture and Design

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window
External sites are not endorsed by ArchitectureWeek.

Library : more Contemporary Design and Architect Articles

Design Last Week

Design Department Archive