New WCMA design unveiled!

We are excited to announce the unveiling of the design for the new Williams College Museum of Art, for the first time giving the museum its own freestanding, purpose-built home!

Prominently located at the western entrance to the Williams College campus and the town, the new museum is conceived to serve the college, the local community, and visitors to the Berkshires through a cluster of four program areas. While slightly set apart like pavilions, the better to accommodate their multiple uses, the program areas are unified through their materials, their openness to the natural setting, their organization around a central gathering place, and a distinctive overarching roof that shelters them all.

From a central lobby, two gallery clusters for temporary exhibitions and the permanent collection radiate toward the north. These galleries provide more than 15,000 square feet of display space, accounting for 35 percent of the net square footage of the building. Spaces for dynamic programming and community engagement greet visitors from the main south-facing entrance, with an auditorium, art studio space, and a café extending toward the southwest. An innovative hybrid gallery-classroom space dedicated to the museum’s signature Object Lab sits to the southeast.

Reaching toward campus to the east, a study center of approximately 6,400 square feet includes dedicated areas for works on paper study, storage, two classrooms for object study, a digital humanities classroom, and a seminar room. A roof of aluminum shingles covers all five volumes of the museum with curves and peaks that engage with the ridgelines of the surrounding mountains. The roof’s broad overhang creates awnings and porches that surround the building, embracing visitors as they approach while providing temperature regulation to reduce energy use and enhance sustainability.

Designed by SO–IL, the internationally recognized Brooklyn-based firm led by Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu, the new Williams College Museum of Art is projected to open in 2027.

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Community forum on new building March 11

The public is warmly welcomed to the Williams Inn at 6 p.m. Monday, March 11, to learn about the new Williams College Museum of Art project. WCMA leadership and the design team will present renderings, construction plans and schedule, and next steps. 

This forum will serve to share the designs with the communities we serve as important stakeholders in the process of building WCMA’s new home and to provide a platform for thoughts and feedback. 

RSVPs appreciated here! Email questions here.

Community Forum