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The Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates (VSBA) addition to the Allentown Art Museum might not be as well-known as the firm’s other museums, such as the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery in London or the Seattle Museum of Art. It nevertheless embodies the same postmodern concepts about history, urban context, and architectural semiotics that are central to the Learning from Las Vegas authors’ work. In late August, the museum announced that it will be moving to a new facility by Studios Architecture in downtown Allentown, Pennsylvania, leaving the future of its VSBA-designed home uncertain.
The planned Studios Architecture-designed, ground-up relocation is in downtown Allentown. Courtesy Studios Architecture
News of the museum’s relocation comes less than 15 years after the completion of the VSBA expansion and renovation. In 2012, VSBA finished a three-story extension to the north of the original neoclassical brick portico along Fifth Street, adding galleries, visitor amenities such as a café, education spaces, and storage. The museum occupied the former First Presbyterian Church, built in 1901, and the addition continues the scale and rhythm of its column front but with a contrasting palette of glass and metal panels outlined with LEDs. A granite base extending from the portico is engraved with the museum’s name, functioning as signage for the institution.
The addition and renovation were originally intended to be an approximately $25 million project, explains Allentown Art Museum CEO Max Weintraub, but due to the difficulties of fundraising circa 2010, during the worst of the Great Recession, the budget was far less. The project description on VSBA’s website lists the construction cost at just $8 million for 35,000 square feet of renovation and 9,000 square feet of addition. “It was a well-intentioned design,” Weintraub told RECORD, “but the circumstances of fundraising and executing a project during that economic downturn only exacerbated some ongoing problems of working within a structure that wasn’t purpose-built to be a museum.” Speaking to RECORD at the time of the project’s completion, VSBA principal in charge Daniel McCoubrey noted that the recession also resulted in the firm’s staff being nearly halved.
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The VSBA-designed addition was completed less than 15 years ago. Photo © Matt Wargo
The museum conducted feasibility studies and determined that due to years of deferred maintenance, problems left unresolved by the 2012 intervention, and issues likely resulting from those budget cuts—such as insufficient thermal breaks along the new Fifth Street facade—the best course of action would be to construct a purpose-built facility. New York City–based Studios Architecture—which, with Selldorf Architects, recently won the competition to overhaul the Louvre in Paris—will spearhead the new 55,000-square-foot, $55 million museum at the intersection of 10th and Hamilton Streets.
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A gallery space in the Allentown Art Museum addition. Photo © Matt Wargo
The building will replace a disused police substation. Although less than a mile from the original, the museum hopes to capitalize on a recent urban revival, where a flurry of new high-rise housing developments, hotels, nightlife venues, and even a science center have reenergized the storied Rust Belt downtown. In 2025, Studios Architecture completed the Archer Music Hall, less than a block from the museum’s new location. Drawing a contrast to the original, Weintraub explains the vision for the new community-engaged building is “a museum as a town square rather than a museum as a temple.” David Burns, a principal at Studios, describes the design as a porous series of available spaces, “a great hall rather than austere galleries.”
Currently, the future of the VSBA-designed addition remains in question. In recent years, both the Sainsbury Wing and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, another VSBA project, received controversial overhauls by Selldorf Architects, which Denise Scott Brown vehemently opposed. Principal Annabelle Selldorf spoke to RECORD about those criticisms. The Allentown Art Museum will likely face significant modifications if not demolition. According to Weintraub, the institution is in conversation with some commercial and public organizations about buying the facilities. Weintraub assuages concerns, saying that there has been no discussion about potential demolition. At the very least, however, the debossed name on the facade will need to be changed.
Construction on the new Allentown Art Museum is expected to begin in summer 2027, with completion anticipated by 2029.
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