Stephanie at Facades+ Denver

Feature
News

Published
September, 2019

Tags
Denver Art Museum, Stephanie Randazzo Dwyer, Events

Stephanie Randazzo Dwyer spoke about the ongoing Denver Art Museum project at the Facades+ Conference in Denver. Along with collaborator Ned Kirshbaum, Technical Design Director of Fentress Architects, Stephanie spoke to the conceptual development and technical execution of the curved glass-clad John J. Sie Welcome Center, while Andrea Kalivas Fulton, Deputy Director and Chief Marketing Officer of the Denver Art Museum, spoke to the Museum’s aspirations and perspective on the project and its process. Together, they presented a uniquely comprehensive project story.

Event Details

Construction progress on the John J. Sie Welcome Center, photo courtesy of the Denver Art Museum

The new John J. Sie Welcome Center at the Denver Art Museum is one part of the combined project to revitalize the original Gio Ponti designed Martin Building (formerly, North Building) and establish a new welcome center at the heart of Denver’s civic and cultural center. A total of 52 glass panels make up the full elliptical façade of the Welcome Center, including 36 curved panels standing 25 feet high and 8 feet wide.

Façade Strategies for Curatorial Institutions

“This panel will detail the design and delivery of significant museum projects underway in Colorado. The presentations will focus on The Denver Art Museum Welcome Center by Fentress Architects in collaboration with Machado Silvetti, as well as Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s nearly completed United States Olympic Museum in Colorado Springs.”

Read more about the event here.

Related Content

  • As a Principal with twenty four years of experience in the field and almost twenty years at Machado Silvetti, Stephanie has a diverse portfolio of cultural and educational projects. She is currently working on a new Museum and Visitor's Center for the Alamo and is finishing the Denver Art Museum's North Building Project, which includes the extensive renovation of the 1971 Gio Ponti-designed North Towers and the design and construction of a new welcome center at the heart of the campus. Learn more about Stephanie’s work and role at Machado Silvetti here.

  • The Denver Art Museum’s campus, comprised of several notable works of architecture including the 1971 Gio Ponti museum tower, commissioned Machado Silvetti for the design of the new Sie Welcome Center which serves as a beacon and an anchor for Denver’s emerging cultural center. Read more about the completed project here.

  • We pursued the deliberate, particular goal of finding and retrieving inspiration from some of Gio Ponti’s ideas that resulted in the creation of the most important design component of the whole project: the defining glass beacon that gives new formal identity to the institution, and new iconic clarity to one of the most vibrant districts of the city of Denver. Read more about the design process of the Denver Art Museum here.

  • Made with curved glass panels, the Welcome Center’s façade creates an elegant surface ripple as its appearance responds to the curvature of the elliptical plan, the environment and the viewer’s own movement around the building. Learn more about the fabrication of the glass used at the Denver Art Museum here.

  • Project updates, upcoming events, construction features, or site visits — Continue exploring news articles and stories here.