Designed by OMA, The Metropolitan Museum of Art?s Costume Institute spring 2016 exhibition, Manus x Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology, on view from May 5 through August 14, explores how designers are reconciling the handmade and the machine-made in the creation of haute couture and avant-garde ready-to-wear. Manus x Machina features over 170 garments, diverse in their designers, techniques, and details. The exhibition is presented in the Robert Lehman Wing, a double-height, octagonal addition on the museum?s central axis constructed in 1975. In order to preserve access to the permanent galleries, the exhibition space is located in the Lehman Wing?s central atrium and corridors. Space posed a number of unique environmental challenges for The Costume Institute?s show: excessive daylighting unconducive to a textile exhibition, split levels, a corridor condition lacking dedicated display walls and an eclectic material palette.
A white, translucent volume was inserted into the existing brick and stone corridors of the Lehman Wing, softening its hard geometries. Echoing the sectional relationship of a central clerestory and perimeter naves, the resulting ghost cathedral resonates with the classical language of the adjacent Medieval Art gallery. A raised platform built across the double height atrium provides continuous circulation and a 2,300 square foot central gallery? an unprecedented intervention in the Lehman Wing. Upon arrival, this domed clerestory orients visitor...