Zaha Hadid in East Lansing, Michigan

The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, in East Lansing, Michigan, designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. Photo: Paul Warchol

The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University, in East Lansing, Michigan, opened on Saturday, November 10. The 46,000-square-foot (-square-meter) project was designed by Zaha Hadid Architects and features a facade of pleated stainless steel and glass.

Dedicated to exploring global contemporary culture and ideas through art, the Broad Art Museum at MSU will serve as both an educational resource for the campus community and a cultural hub for the Mid-Michigan region. The museum will present contemporary works within a historical context through access to a study collection of more than 7,500 objects, ranging from the Greek and Roman periods to modern art.

A gallery space of the Broad Museum. Photo: Paul Warchol

The two-story building features galleries for special exhibitions, modern and contemporary art, new media, photography, and works on paper. The facility also includes an education wing, a works-on-paper study center, a gift shop, and a café. Adjacent to the museum is an outdoor sculpture garden and a large pedestrian plaza.

Broad Museum site plan drawing. Image: Zaha Hadid Architects

The Broad Museum also prominently marks one of the main MSU campus gateways at the corner of Grand River Avenue and Farm Lane.<

Zaha Hadid Architects described the building:

"The vital street life on the northern side of Grand River Avenue and the historic heart of the university campus at the south side generate a network of path and visual connections, some of them part of the current footpath layout, others as shortcuts between the city and the campus side of Grand River Avenue. This highly frequented interface between city and campus gets an additional layer by the traffic along Grand River Avenue in east-west-direction, the main road of East Lansing and the main approach street to the campus entrances east and west of the site.

"The building is achieved by folding these different circulation and visual connections to create an ‘urban carpet’ which brings together and negotiates the different pathways on which people move through and around the site.

"The Broad Museum presents as a sharp, directed body, comprising directional pleats which reflect the topographic and circulatory characteristics of its surrounding landscape. Its outer skin echoes these different directions and orientations – giving the building an ever-changing appearance on passing, creating great curiosity yet never quite revealing its content. This open character underlines the museum’s function as a cultural hub for the community."

The museum is clad in stainless steel and glass. Photo: Paul Warchol

The museum is named in honor of MSU alumnus Eli Broad and his wife, Edythe, who provided the lead gift of $28 million for the museum. Zaha Hadid Architects won the project commission in 2007 after a multi-step competition led by architecture and design critic Joseph Giovannini.

Photo: Paul Warchol

Project Credits

• Architect: Zaha Hadid Architects
• Design: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher
• Project Director: Craig Kiner, Nils Fischer
• Project Architect: Alberto Barba
• Competition Project Director: Nils Fischer
• Competition Project Architect: Britta Knobel, Fulvio Wirz
• Project Team: Michael Hargens, Edgar Payan Pacheco, Sophia Razzaque, Arturo Revilla, Charles Walker
• Competition Team: Melike Altinisik, Rojia Forouhar, Mariagrazia Lanza, Daniel Widrig
• Local Architect: Integrated Design Solutions (Michigan, USA)
• Structural: Adams Kara Taylor (London, UK), SDI (Michigan, USA)
• M&E / Environmental: Max Fordham and Partners (London, UK), Peter Basso (Michigan, USA)

Metal fins over glazing at the Broad Museum. Photo: Paul Warchol

Photo: Paul Warchol

Photo: Paul Warchol

Photo: Paul Warchol

Photo: Paul Warchol

Photo: Paul Warchol