For all its acclaim, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum had been housed for over a century behind a dull, largely unadorned exterior concealing the magical array of treasures within. Along comes Renzo Piano’s addition to more than double the museum’s space. Set back a respectful 50-foot distance from the faux Venetian palace dedicated in 1903, its sloping glass walls and copper-sheathed cubes lend it the air of a cutting-edge science laboratory that wandered across the Charles River from the MIT campus.
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Mrs. Gardner had the good luck (in the future's terms) to build within a city that would continue to develop around her, so that the present day hordes of museum goers can be absorbed within the urban fabric, all the while, thanks to the Piano addition, preserving her vision. Dr. Barnes chose to build in a suburb that has remained a suburb; it cannot so easily accommodate the tour buses, etc., that posterity requires. Barnes himself, of course, would never have permitted the tour buses, but once posterity legally wrested the rights of visitation and crowds were allowed to enter, the suburban location was doomed. We'll see whether the next Barnes Foundation can approach the eccentric beauty of the original.
I like the canaries.