In The Future, We Will All Be Piazzas: PAFA Reveals Plans For Lenfest Plaza
This afternoon, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts revealed its approved conceptual designs for Lenfest Plaza, a new pedestrian court that will take up that little sliver of what is now Cherry Street at Broad. Designed by David Rubin at landscape architectural firm OLIN, Lenfest Plaza will be open 24/7, feature an as-yet unnamed “upscale restauarant” (paging Starr or Garces?), and a “major work of art is being commissioned by a renowned sculptor and rotating works of emerging and established artists will be continually on display.” We like it, both as a concept and bridge from the rest of Center City to Chinatown and the Eraserhood. That stretch of Cherry Street has always been useless anyway, and seeing how PAFA is actually the REAL art school in this town (sorry UArts and Art Institute), a little more landmark-age certainly won’t hurt. No word yet on when construction is set to begin.
[Image courtesy: OLIN]
March 22nd, 2010 at 4:16 pm
glad they’re taking advantage of their position across the street from the new front door of the Convention Ctr. Now can they clean the exterior of the beautiful Furness building already?
March 22nd, 2010 at 8:47 pm
god, more big stupid sculptures in philadelphia.
March 23rd, 2010 at 11:22 am
@ericlewis
How do you know the sculpture will be big and/or stupid?
March 23rd, 2010 at 12:51 pm
He’s probably the sculptor.
March 23rd, 2010 at 3:07 pm
he probably went to pafa. but in all seriousness Tyler is a pretty credible institution (if not more so than pafa) and churns out artists who make pretty good work. some might say that building a piazza on their grounds might even cheapen an institution..
March 24th, 2010 at 11:15 pm
Tyler actually has a better reputation nationally than any other art school in Philadelphia. It hovers around 5th in the country in terms of art schools (With Yale, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Maryland Institute College of Art, being among the top 5).
I’m not sure if PAFA even ranks in the top 30.
March 26th, 2010 at 2:09 am
uh hello? do you want a 30 foot paint brush to let you know where you are if you didn’t already?