Philadelphia Athenaeum of the Future

Philadelphia Athenaeum of the Future

Loikits, Scott

Padgett, Haley

Milbrandt, Mark

Ruzeu, Dan

New York, NY, USA

2014

005-LF-P020

GreenbergFarrow

Professional

• Technology will keep improving and gain more integration into life. It will diminish working time, leaving more time for creative acts.
• Libraries will be irrelevant as places for gaining information.
• Technology will not change the volumetric characteristics of typical spaces.
• Architectural record storage will become more and more digital.
• Physical records will become more and more fossilized; they will be displayed much like pieces in a museum.
• The Athenaeum will become a greater digital resource for designers, and will display architecture’s storied history.
• Building materials will become more resilient and interactive, leaving no room for void space

To stay relevant, Athenaeum will need to abandon it’s typical use as a storage and display space for records, and develop into place for cultural/technological innovation. We developed a number of programs to achieve this “hub-of-culture” status. Assuming volumes housing these programs were not going to change, we decided to make void spaces/hallways places for technological innovation, housing interactive walls/new technologies. Architectural record display/storage would go in the core, forcing users to connect with the past, while on their way to the latest tech. Core as brick, vertical and horizontal openings with I-beams alludes to past architecture.

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