New York Construction Report staff writer
The Bronx Children’s Museum is now open in a new $14-million location to create a new and permanent home for the Museum. The project was managed by New York City’s Department of Design and Construction (DDC) for NYC Parks, DCLA and the Museum.
The site at the Bronx Terminal Market, the 13,800-square-foot building was designed with an architecture of organic flow inside the rectangular frame of a 1925 historic powerhouse.
Inspired by Jean Piaget’s Child’s Conception of Space, the design’s creates space that “connects children to the experience of natural landscape and the Harlem River and all spaces were designed in perspective from a child’s eye height.” The tall, light-filled open space has views of the Harlem River and opens into the main exhibition space.
Natural materials are used throughout the Museum including wood, stone, cork, linoleum and glass. Soft blue and green colors create a natural palette for the Museum’s exhibitions. The sky-blue acoustical plaster ceiling compliments the grounded warm wood. Translucent guardrails are made of recycled acrylic molded into curved panels.
The walls, partitions, and elevated floors are made of cross-laminated timber (CLT), fabricated with advanced digital technology allowing for varying radii arcs to form organic space.
Work also included the installation of new mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems. The Museum is slated to achieve LEED Silver Certification.
The project was designed by O’Neill McVoy Architects and the design was carried out by A Quest Corporation.
“Architects O’Neill McVoy understood just what we envisioned from the beginning – a combination of a fine arts museum space and a children’s museum that emulates a natural landscape with all its beauty, twists and turns, surprises and diversity,” said Bronx Children’s Museum Founding Executive Director, Carla Precht. “The space reflects the fluidity of water which is an overarching theme throughout the Museum exhibits, space, experiences and programming.”
