Children's Museum to Unveil Design for 51,000-SF Expansion

NEW YORK CITY-The world’s first museum created expressly for kids, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, today will reveal plans for a major expansion that will double the institution’s size and capacity. When the $39-million project is complete, the museum will comprise 102,000 sf with the capacity to serve 400,000 visitors per year, beginning in 2006.

Rafael Viñoly, designer of the Tokyo International Forum, the Kimmel Center for the Performing arts in Philadelphia, and New York’s forthcoming Frederick P. Rose Hall for Jazz at Lincoln Center, is the architect of the brightly colored addition to the 103-year-old museum. “I think there needs to be an awareness that buildings you put up have a real effect on a city, on people’s lives,” Viñoly says. “Architecture is a force for creating civic pride. And in the case of Brooklyn Children’s Museum, also a force for shaping the creativity of young minds.”

The expansion will greatly enhance the largely below-grade museum’s street presence, connecting the original 51,000-sf building with the 51,000-sf expansion through 3,000 sf of renovated space. The new construction will be fully integrated with the Museum’s present building through a series of corridors, staircases, and wheelchair-accessible ramps.