Children's Museum of the Arts, NY. workAC.

New York’s Children’s Museum of the Arts has secured a space three times the size of their previous location, giving children extra room to learn more about art. The work of architecture practice workAC has turned an old loading dock into a children’s space meeting the needs of varied age groups.



The spatial organisation of the museum starts from the existing building that is oriented to go with the visitor flow.



The ground floor is for the youngest children and their parents, where each room offers a wide variety of activities, and there’s even a brightly coloured, padded quiet room.



Spanning above the entrance, and part of the colour band, a bridge features graffiti art and links to the museum’s famous Ball Pond, a very inviting green circular structure highly visible to the entrance and the outside. A colour wheel identifies the different children’s programmes in the spaces.



7 years and up kids can access the large multipurpose art gallery on the upper level, along with classrooms, art studios and media lab. The media lab’s vestibule is the “clay bar” – where a bartender serves modelling clay to kids.





workAC designed the new CMA to inspire children to both make art and learn about it in the most appropriate way for them – through play; a place where production and presentation of art occur seamlessly.

Project: workAC, http://work.ac/
Location: New York, USA
Year: 2011
Photos: Courtesy of workAC © Ari Marcopoulos