Storm King Art Centre

New Windsor, New York | 2016-2025

Storm King Art Center - a series of landscape rooms - is defined by its woodland edge. The arrival sequence to the Center uses a strategy of routes to and through clearings, guiding the visitor through the woodland to arrive at Storm King.

The project was part of a substantial capital renovation, the first in the sculpture park’s 65-year history. Working in collaboration with Heneneghan Peng Architects and WXY Architecture + Urban Design, our competition-winning design seeks to redefine the Storm King visitor experience as it winds through inhabited woodland. The entrance appears as an opening in the forest—a shaft of light allowing verdant green vegetation and subtle, but effective signage.

The arrival maintains a forest-like quality. Parking and drop-offs, ticketing and information, washing hands and walking are all accomplished in a lush forest environment. The design of the Parking Lot acknowledges the seasonality of the site and uses this to merge the lot into the forest. Central bays are paved with hardscape, and the lot’s surface gradually changes to grass for areas that are used more intermittently. Retaining and replanting as many trees as possible has maintained the forest experience.

Glimpsed through trees at the forest’s edge, visitors are drawn into Storm King by light falling onto the foliage of native reeds, marginal plants and water in the wetland.

The ticket pavilion is located at the edge of the wetland, the threshold to Storm King. The pavilion forms a portal and guides the visitor towards “The Arch” by Alexander Calder.