Portland Museum of Art
Portland Museum of Art
Portland, Maine
For over 12,000 years the Wabanaki have welcomed the dawn as a connection between people and place. This competition-winning proposal for the Portland Museum of Art pays homage to Wabanaki worldviews by embracing the light and introducing a new cultural experience where newcomers, old timers, and original peoples—all people—belong. During the summer solstice, the museum expansion’s curved roof cradles the rising sun; in winter, the sun illuminates the central indoor public space, and the generous exterior spaces become civic areas for basking in the Maine light. In the hyper-seasonal winter and shoulder seasons, the low light rakes the gardens, and plazas, providing a pleasurable microclimate in advance of entering the new Museum Wing. Generous and airy, the design is an expression of the natural world made from regionally sourced timber, terracotta, and granite.
To unify the campus, our design removes barriers and meaningfully integrates the museum’s site with the life of the City. A proposed interior “Free Street” and the adjoining landscapes form the connective tissue that unites eclectic buildings and programs across the two-acre campus. The reimagined sculpture court becomes a light-filled, universally accessible plaza: a celebratory entry to new, flexible performance and creative spaces.
The Free Street brings the energy of the city into the museum, greeting visitors with unexpected spaces where visitors can participate in the arts, get their hands dirty and make noise. This includes a community lounge, maker spaces, and a new performance hall. The Free Street extends four stories up to the rooftop terrace, revealing layers of art and activity.
The PMA’s “multi-vocal” approach to curation is emboldened with spaces that put making, performance, and exhibition in dialogue without prioritizing one over the other. People engage art in multiple ways and on their own terms.
Flipping the narrative of the traditional museum (a colonial artifact from the time of appropriation and imperialism), the new wing and campus design of the PMA creates a new type of museum, and in doing so creates a place where all the arts and all the people belong together.
Project timeline: 2022 - ongoing
Client: Portland Museum of Art
Scope:
Design Competition
Full Services Design Award
Project Type: Urban | Culture | Campus | Garden
Size: 2 Acre Campus
Partners:
Lever Architecture, Design Lead
Chris Newell / Akomawt, Indigenous Inclusion
Openbox, Equity & Inclusion
ARUP, Lighting, Acoustical, Theater, Security, AV/IT
Simons Architects, Architect of Record
Guy Nordensen & Associates, Structural Design Engineer
Thornton Tomasetti, Structural Engineer of Record
Altieri Sebor Weber, MEP/FP Engineer
Once-Future Office, Signage, Graphics & Wayfinding
Studio Pacifica, Accessibility / Universal Design
Woodard & Curran, Civil Engineer
Simpson Gumpertz & Heger, Envelope Consultant
Stuart Lynn, Cost Consultant
Awards & Recognition
The team is the winning design selected from 100+ entrants and a shortlist of four. The International Design Competition was designed, developed, and led by Dovetail Design Strategists.
