The Build Up

After a period of concepts and temporary installations, a rising generation of practitioners tackles spaces for art and culture.

- Mimi Zeiger

This November, the Manetti Shrem Museum on the University of California, Davis, campus opened to the public. Designed by New York City– based SO-IL with the San Francisco office of Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, the museum pays homage to the agricultural landscape of California’s Central Valley with an oversize roof canopy. The steel members of the 50,000-square-foot shade structure, nearly twice the size of the museum itself, reference the patterning of plowed fields and create a welcoming outdoor space for visitors. It is both expressive and practical, but getting that balance wasn’t easy.

SO-IL, founded by Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu in 2008, has a portfolio filled with smaller projects, installations, and exhibition-related work. The Manetti Shrem Museum is easily the firm’s largest work to date, demanding a rigorous design-build process while maintaining a strong conceptual vision. In short, it required architecture.

For some emerging firms, architecture’s delicate pas de deux between ideas and physical realization is a newfound pleasure and challenge. The economic consequences of the late-2000s recession meant that many young designers entered into practice at a time of limited building opportunity. Research dominated, and commissions—seemingly juicy ones—came in the form of installations or exhibitions.

Although a great way to develop conceptual ideas on architecture, these smaller, temporary works sometimes prove an awkward training ground for larger-scale, permanent projects.