Machado and Silvetti Architects - The Bowdoin College Museum of Art

Wednesday, 12 December 2007 19:00

A renovation and addition to a historic museum.

Located in Brunswick, Maine, the Bowdoin College Museum of Art is a historic building originally designed by Charles Follen McKim of McKim, Mead and White and dedicated in 1894. It is considered a Landmark in North American museum architecture. The project by Machado and Silvetti Architects had to on enlarge the existing museum to accommodate the museum’s expanding needs. The project also needed to update the building systems. The architects had therefore to bring the museum into Twenty first Century requirements while keeping the integrity of the original nineteenth Century building.

Set to enhance the Museum's major role on the Bowdoin campus, this $20 million project completely rejuvenates the project. Not only does it address new program needs, it updates the building with the necessary code and accessibility upgrades. It incorporates state of the art security and climate control systems to meet current museum standards.

A dramatic glass, bronze and blackened steel pavilion on the south side of the original building provides a new entry to the expanded museum from the town of Brunswick to the West and the Bowdoin College quad to the East. This six hundred square foot pavilion houses a gracious new steel and stone stair and glass elevator which lead down to visitor service spaces and a new lower level gallery entrance.

A larger addition on the west side of the historic structure houses seven new galleries, including a dedicated seminar room, and includes an upgraded loading facility and high capacity elevator as well as a new public stair connecting upper and lower gallery spaces. To support the teaching mission of the museum, the design of the 30,000 square foot project provided a highly efficient administrative office wing and high-density archival storage spaces.

The restoration of the Walker Art Building included structural and waterproofing upgrades as well as new gallery lighting, signage and the insertion of state of the art mechanical systems within the historic building envelope.

Status Completed in 2007
Size 30,000 sf
Budget $20,000 million

Bowdoin College Museum of Art Credit List

Project Name: Bowdoin College Museum of Art; Brunswick, Maine
Client: Bowdoin College
President: Barry Mills. Museum Director: Katy Kline. Project Manager: Don Borkowski

Architect:
Machado and Silvetti Associates, LLC, 560 Harrison Avenue, Third Floor, Boston, MA 02118
Principal-in-charge: Jorge Silvetti.
Consulting Principal: Rodolfo Machado
Project Director and Architect of Record: Conrad Ello, AIA
Project Architect: Edwin Goodell, AIA
Senior Designers: Seiee Kim, Mimi Love
Construction Administration Support: David Dahlbom
Project Team: Paul Schlapobersky, Kelly Smith, Miks Karklins, Balasz Bognar, Chris Grimley, Natalie Sys, Andrew Hamblin

Contractor for Renovation and New Construction: Consigli Construction Co., Inc., 197 Main Street, Milford, MA 01757
Anthony Consigli, Michael Walker – Project Manager, David Onos – Project Superintendent, Nick Collins – Project Engineer, Jeremy Whitehouse
Structural Engineer: Richmond So Engineers Inc, 85 Main Street, Watertown, MA 02472
Richmond So, P.E., Jennifer McClain, P.E., Kris Francois, P.E.
MEP/FP Engineers: Altieri Sebor Wieber LLC, 31 Knight Street, Norwalk, CT 06851
Andrew Sebor, P.E., Vladimir Goldin, Melvin Patrick, Ed Klesh
Waterproofing/Building Envelope Engineers: Simpson Gumpertz & Heger Inc., 41 Seyon Street, Building 1, Suite 500, Waltham, MA 02453
Kevin Cash, Brent Gabby
Lighting Design: LAM Partners, 84 Sherman Street, Cambridge, MA 02140
Jennifer Pieszak, IALD, Paul Zaferiou, IALD, RA
Specification Writer: Collective Wisdom, 75 Bay State Road, Weston, MA 02193
Richard White
Civil Engineer: SYTDesign, P.O. Box 86A, 160 Longwoods Road, Cumberland, ME 04021 Anne Archino-Howe
Landscape Architect: Carol R. Johnson Associates Inc., 115 Broad Street, Boston, MA 02110
Elevator Design: Van Deusen & Associates, 198 Tremont Street, Suite 443, Boston, MA 02116