O'Neill McVoy inserts a mass-timber stuffed youngsters's museum into Twenties Bronx powerhouse
Brooklyn studio O’Neill McVoy Architects has tailored a historic powerhouse right into a museum for kids within the Bronx that highlights the historic constructing whereas including playful particulars reminiscent of a curved mass-timber walkway.
O’Neill McVoy Architects inserted the Bronx Youngsters’s Museum into the second ground of the rectilinear constructing “with outdated and new in a symbiotic relation heightening the qualities of the opposite,” the studio stated.
Situated on the Harlem River and Mill Pond Park, the 1925 Historic Bronx Terminal Market Powerhouse was decommissioned in 2004 and the constructing’s exterior was restored in 2009, leaving the inside concrete and metal loft area open for a brand new program.
Owned by the New York Metropolis Division of Parks, it broke floor in 2017 however wasn’t accomplished till 2022 as a result of COVID-19 pandemic and bureaucratic delays.
The 15,160-square foot (1,400-square metre) museum is accessed by way of a double-height, river-side foyer area that opens to curving kinds designed particularly for a kid’s perspective.
As the primary facility within the burrow devoted to younger youngsters, “the design’s movement creates a brand new sort of area, not like the town’s mobile rooms and road grids, that connects Bronx youngsters to the expertise of pure panorama and the waterfront”, the studio stated.
Drawing from Jean Piaget’s e book Kid’s Conception of House, the studio used a collection of unspooling areas catered to youngsters underneath 10 years outdated.
Museum guests transfer by way of the area through ramps, and targeted displays are separated by partial-height, curved wood and translucent acrylic partition partitions that spiral, diverge and reconnect.
The areas step up, transferring from the Waterways exhibition that directs views to the neighbouring river, throughout a bridge, to the Cloud efficiency mezzanine that options an interactive set up by native artist Jerome LaMarr known as Bronxtopia.
The LEED Gold-certified undertaking is the “first use of curved cross-laminated timber (CLT) within the U.S.,” based on the studio.
The CLT was reportedly sustainably harvested and chosen for its gentle weight and energy.
It was “fabricated with superior digital know-how permitting for various radii arcs to type natural area”.
“Giant wall and guardrail interlocking panels, many with pebble-shaped home windows, have been molded and CNC-milled to precise dimension permitting fast meeting on web site,” the staff continued, referencing the customized molds of Charles and Ray Eames’ laminated plywood splints.
The CLT panels additionally interlock with etched, recycled-acrylic panels which might be softer to the contact than glass.
Overhead, the uncovered structural beams and mechanical companies have been painted blue, as was the acoustical plaster, to type a sky the place material ducts dangle as clouds.
The museum additionally makes use of translucent movie on the east-facing home windows to mitigate the daylight that sweeps by way of the open plan, and dimmable LED fixtures and daylighting sensors optimize gentle.
Operable home windows enable for air flow and sensors assist cut back HVAC vitality consumption.
The outside of the brick constructing was comparatively untouched however the “distinctive turrets are given new life with prismatic movie and spectral LED lighting to function beacons for the kids’s museum in the neighborhood.”
Equally, Olson Kundig inserted a curved timber ark right into a concrete market corridor to create the ANOHA youngsters’s museum in Berlin.
The images is by Paul Warchol.
Challenge credit:
Architect: O’Neill McVoy Architects
Beth O’Neill, AIA, Principal
Chris McVoy, Principal
Ruso Margishvili, Affiliate-in-Cost
Richard Stora, Challenge Architect
Penelope Phylactopoulos, Meghan O’Shea, Trevor Hollyn Taub, Irmak Ciftci, Challenge Workforce
Structural engineer: Silman
Mechanical engineer: Plus Group Consulting Engineering, PLCC
Electrical engineer: Plus Group Consulting Engineering, PLCC
Basic contractor: A Quest Company
Lighting designer: Tillotson Design Associates
Code marketing consultant: CODE LLC
LEED marketing consultant: ADS Engineers
AV/IT/Safety marketing consultant: TM Expertise Companions
Displays: Bronx-connected artists by way of the museum’s ‘Arts Builds Neighborhood’ program
