Architecture, Landscape, Experience: Shaping Storm King’s Capital Project

Storm King Art Center’s capital project, the first in the museum’s 65-year history, has reimagined the visitor experience, thoughtfully integrating the relationship between land, art, and people which is central to the museum’s vision.

Join us for a panel conversation with Storm King leadership and members of the architectural team for the ambitious project, which opens to the public in May 2025. The panel will discuss how the elements of the project—new welcome pavilions and an outdoor lobby for visitors; a dedicated building for conservation, fabrication, and maintenance; and five acres of reclaimed landscape for exhibitions and programming—demonstrate a holistic approach to sustainability, elevate the visitor experience, and support the institution’s visionary work with artists.

Speakers:
Róisín Heneghan, Director, Heneghan Peng Architects
Nora Lawrence, Executive Director, Storm King Art Center
Beka Sturges, Principal, Reed Hilderbrand
Amy Weisser, Deputy Director, Strategic Planning and Projects, Storm King Art Center
Claire Weisz, FAIA, RAIC, Hon. FASLA, Principal-in-Charge, WXY Architecture + Urban Design

About the Speakers:
Roisin Heneghan is an architect and co-founder of heneghan peng architects, a practice integrating landscape, urban planning, and architecture, with offices in Dublin and Berlin. She earned a Bachelor of Architecture from University College Dublin and an M.Arch from Harvard GSD. With Shih-Fu Peng, she founded a competition practice in New York, winning the Architectural League Prize in 1999. After winning a competition in Ireland in 2001, she moved to Dublin. The firm has won major competitions, including the Grand Egyptian Museum, and received the Aga Khan Award, RIBA Stirling Prize, and Mies van der Rohe Award nominations. Storm King Art Center is the firm's first U.S. project.

Nora Lawrence (she/her) is the Executive Director of Storm King Art Center. Lawrence has played an integral role in raising the museum’s profile—seeing the Art Center’s audience grow four-fold and while bringing in a new generation of artists. Lawrence recently co-curated the 2023 site-specific commission with Martin Puryear. Lawrence has developed nearly 20 exhibitions with Storm King’s curatorial team, working with artists including Lynda Benglis, Mark Dion, Rashid Johnson, and Wangechi Mutu. She established Storm King’s annual Outlooks program, which invites one artist to realize a temporary site-specific work. Lawrence also co-founded the Shandaken: Storm King residency at Storm King.

Beka Sturges is a Partner and Principal of Reed Hilderbrand and manages the firm’s New Haven office where she leads both private and public projects. Her work is noted for its powerful spatial demonstration of the cultural and environmental value of landscapes. Sturges’ current projects include landscapes at Powder Mountain in Eden Utah, Storm King Art Center in New York’s Hudson Valley, and Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington D.C. Collaborating with the City of New Haven, she initiated the implementation of a linear park vision plan for the City's Mill River Trail. She served as the project landscape architect and manager for the award-winning expansion of The Clark Art Institute in the Berkshires. A committed educator, Sturges is a Senior Critic at the Yale School of Architecture.

At Storm King Art Center, Amy Weisser incubates projects focused on the institution’s strategic growth. She is the project director for Storm King’s capital project, opening in May 2025. In her 30 years at cultural institutions undergoing profound development, Weisser has worked with the Obama Presidential Center, led exhibition development for the National September 11 Memorial Museum from more than a decade, and helped open Dia:Beacon and the American Museum of Natural History’s Rose Center for Earth and Space. Weisser taught Museum Studies at New York University and is a member of the Program Committee for Building Museums. Weisser holds a doctorate in Art History from Yale University.

Claire Weisz, FAIA, RAIC, Hon. FASLA, is the Founding Principal of WXY, an architecture and urban design firm focused on creating equitable, vibrant, and healthy buildings, places, and systems. Among its award-winning projects are the Spring Street Sanitation Garage and Salt Shed, the rooftop pavilion and farm at the Javits Center, and The Drawing Center. Weisz is also a co-founder and former co-executive director of The Design Trust for Public Space. She was awarded the prestigious Medal of Honor by the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIANY) in 2018 and was honored with the Women in Architecture Award by Architectural Record in 2019.

This event is offered in person and virtually. If you register for a virtual ticket, you will receive an email with a Zoom link to access the program.