The Met opens redesigned Rockefeller Wing by WHY Architecture

WHY Architecture has completed its overhaul of the Michael C Rockefeller Wing at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which houses cultural artefacts from Africa, Oceania and the Ancient Americas.

The galleries that display The Met's Arts of Africa, the Arts of Oceania, and the Arts of Oceania collections – closed since 2021 – reopened to the public last month.

The major renovation of the 40,000-square-foot (3,700-square-metre) wing encompasses a new spatial layout that is intended to enhance circulation, support cross-cultural narratives and offer a more legible visitor experience.

WHY Architecture, founded by Kulapat Yantrasast, collaborated with restoration specialists Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and the museum's Design Department on the project.

"The Michael C Rockefeller Wing affirms WHY's belief that museums are true sites of empathy," said Yantrasast. "Spaces where visitors from many different places can encounter and appreciate the artworks from other cultures around the world."

"Through our design with The Met, we hope to highlight the diversity and distinction within these rich collections while providing a welcoming and memorable sense of place," he added.

The Michael C Rockefeller Wing first opened in 1982, when the museum incorporated the collections of Nelson Rockefeller and his son Michael, and features a long expanse of slanted windows along its south-west facade.

This stretch of glazing overlooking Central Park was entirely replaced with new custom-designed panels that filter daylight in order to preserve the artefacts on display.

The reorganised layout swaps the rigidly segmented geographic sections of the original design by Kevin Roche and John Dinkeloo for a more porous and overlapping set of displays.

Visitors arrive from the Roman and Greek galleries into the African arts area, topped with an arched white-ribbed ceiling.

The light-sensitive Oceanic art has been moved away from the large windows and closer to the museum's interior, in a series of galleries arranged diagonally through the wing.

Meanwhile, the stone, metal and ceramic pieces from the ancient Americas are now bathed in daylight.

"In galleries dedicated to each of the distinct collection areas, design elements reference and pay homage to the architectural vernaculars of each region," said WHY Architecture.

The redesigned galleries also include new acquisitions of historic and contemporary art from Africa galleries and an area dedicated to light-sensitive ancient Andean textiles.

Founded by Yantrasast in 2004, WHY Architecture is renowned for its work on cultural institutions and art galleries – see 10 of the studio's projects in this sector.

In an interview with Dezeen in 2018, when The Met wing redesign was announced, the architect explained his role as "a matchmaker between art and people".

The museum is also currently undergoing a major expansion to its Tang Wing designed by Mexican architect Frida Escobedo, due to open in 2030.

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