Last December, the 100-year-old Cleveland Museum of Natural History completed an $8.9 million overhaul of its Thelma and Kent H. Smith Environmental Courtyard and the upgrade of its 450-seat Murch Auditorium. The courtyard was one of several “gateway” projects that have been interim stages of a $150 million expansion and renovation of the Museum, whose new 50,000-sf Exhibit Hall, main lobby, and café are scheduled to break ground this Thursday.
Sonia Winner, the Museum’s President and CEO, told the Cleveland Plain Dealer that the institution was also planning an $11.4 million upgrade of its central utility plant.
Since 1958, when the Museum moved to its current location, it has expanded at least six times. The latest expansion, designed by DLR Group, will feature a curving, snow-white roof made from cast-concrete panels and intended to evoke the glacier that covered Northeast Ohio during the last ice age. (Panzica Construction is the GC on this project.)
The museum’s latest expansion and renovation will create new exhibits, developed by Gallagher & Associates, and add curatorial posts for the purposes of connecting, in new ways, the Museum’s collections and research with public education and programming.
A rendering of the Museum's Planetary Process Gallery. The Museum's exhibit reorganization will attempt to connect humanity to the larger universe. Image: Gallagher & Associates
RETELLING HISTORY’S MARCH
The museum, which pre-pandemic was drawing 260,000 visitors annually, holds more than five million artifacts and specimens, and, through its Natural Areas program, stewards more than 11,000 acres of nature preserve in Northeast Ohio. Massive new exterior glass walls will wrap around the addition’s façade to open sightlines between the exhibits and the surrounding landscape of Wade Oval.
Inside, the traditional museum organization—by time period, geography, and species—is being deconstructed to tell integrated stories of planetary and biological processes.
The goal of this “reinvention” is to show more clearly how humanity intersects with the continuum of life on Earth and universal forces.
“We are creating a new model for natural history museums that uses the past to inform our present to build a better future together,” explains Winner. “Our reimagined museum will illuminate the interconnectedness of human life and the natural world, and how science is essential to our lives.”
An “environmental courtyard,” which received an $8.9 million makeover, now serves as one of the Museum's gateways. Image: Cleveland Museum of Natural History
EVOLUTION ON DISPLAY
The museum addition (parts of which are scheduled to open next year) is being constructed on what currently is a parking lot, and will include a central welcome and orientation area, another gateway. The new Visitors Hall will feature a reconstruction of “Lucy,” the 3.2-million-year-old human ancestor that a team of Cleveland museum scientists first discovered 45 years ago, as well as a geological sample collected from the Moon, and specimens of modern-day animals to illustrate evolutionary and biological changes.
A new self-guided interactive space, The Ames Family Curiosity Center, is meant to connect the museum’s collections with its visitors’ lived experiences and global science-related news.
The addition and renovation should be completed sometime in 2024.
Each of the Museum's exhibitions will be part of a larger evolutionary story. Image: DLR Group
Related Stories
Museums | Apr 23, 2015
Moshe Safdie unveils pentagonal scheme for National Medal of Honor Museum
The new museum near Charleston, S.C., will archive the history of the nation's highest military honorees.
Museums | Apr 22, 2015
Check out Ralph Johnson's stunning nature-inspired Shanghai museum
The newly opened Shanghai Natural History Museum, designed by Perkins+Will’s Global Design Director Ralph Johnson, mimics the shape of a nautilus shell, and features natural elements throughout.
Museums | Apr 16, 2015
SANAA and Snøhetta tie at first place for Budapest museum bid
The two firms submitted designs for the New National Gallery and Ludwig Museum, one of five planned museums to be constructed in a park just outside the urban center of Hungary’s capital.
Sponsored | Fire-Rated Products | Apr 14, 2015
Fire resistive curtain wall brings maximum light, views and safety to Aspen Art Museum
The curtain wall used for the Shigeru Ban-designed museum provides maximum daylight while protecting the art from fire
Museums | Apr 10, 2015
Henning Larsen Architects designs timber museum extension in Sweden
The new extension will complement Österund’s wooded surroundings
Building Team Awards | Apr 10, 2015
14 projects that push AEC teaming to the limits
From Lean construction to tri-party IPD to advanced BIM/VDC coordination, these 14 Building Teams demonstrate the power of collaboration in delivering award-winning buildings. These are the 2015 Building Team Award winners.
Building Team Awards | Apr 9, 2015
9/11 museum triumphs over controversy
The Building Team for this highly visible project had much more than design, engineering, and construction problems to deal with.
High-rise Construction | Mar 16, 2015
Mexican Museum tower caught in turmoil to break ground this summer in San Francisco
Millennium Partners said it will break ground on the 53-story residential and museum tower while the lawsuits go through the appeals process.
Museums | Mar 9, 2015
Architecture based on astronomy principles for new planetarium in Shanghai
The ancient Chinese civilization left some of the earliest records of humans studying the stars and skies. To exhibit this long history, a new planetarium and astronomy museum is planned for construction in Shanghai.
Museums | Mar 5, 2015
A giant, silver loop in Dubai will house the Museum of the Future
The Sheikh of Dubai hopes the $136 million museum will serve as an incubator for ideas and real designs—a global destination for inventors and entrepreneurs.
