SFMOMA Thinks Big in Expansion
Novel Wing Would Double Modern Art Museum’s Space
By Geoffrey A. Fowler
The Wall Street Journal

San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art is broadening the scope—and budget—of a new wing that would bring a bold contemporary look to the city’s downtown and allow the museum to display vastly more art when it opens in 2016.

On Wednesday, the museum unveiled design details of the 235,000-square-foot expansion that will nestle behind its existing building near Yerba Buena Gardens and double SFMOMA’s space. Its 10 stories will rise 190 feet in a block-shaped structure sculpted to flow into the buildings and streets that surround it.

The unorthodox white concrete building, which includes terraces and staircases its creators say were inspired by the Filbert Steps of Telegraph Hill, is the product of an architectural puzzle: How to bridge disparate plots of land inside a major South of Market block without disrupting the function and aesthetics of the surrounding buildings.

The museum declined to give the expected construction cost of the wing—part of a $555 million project, up 15%, that also includes a larger endowment—saying the plans are still evolving.

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