In this project, a former 1976 five-plex movie theatre of faux Spanish style is inventively repurposed as a contemporary art museum on the cultural campus of Scottsdale, AZ. SMoCA’s entry pavilion is clad in a curving metal skin formed of randomly seamed galvanized steel panels. It pays homeage to the similarly curved facades of the neighboring performing art center of by Arizona master architect Bennie Gonzales. A east facing glass entry portal opens into the museum’s admission/shop area to the north and enclosed garden to the south where sunlight plays across the ‘scrim wall’ of translucent and colored dicroic glass by James Carpenter as it embraces, ‘Knight Rising’, 2001, a skyspace by James Turrell.

The interion transition zone is a refined balance of translucent luminous light, polished concrete, blackened steel, MDF wall paneling and over-scaled custom crafted maple gallery doors. The main galleries enjoy total flexibility for installations, varied artificial and natural lighting and state of the art climate controls as well as a common curved western wall for easy circulation.