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Skirball Cultural Center exterior view
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Since 1996, the Skirball Cultural Center has welcomed over two
million visitors to its exhibitions and programs. The Skirball campus
features a world-class interactive museum, children's discovery
center, learning resource center, conference center, classrooms,
auditoriums, outdoor courtyards, and a communal hall and performing
arts center.
Every week the Cultural Center is host to a diverse range of music,
theater, dance, and other performing arts events, films, family
programs, and distinguished speakers from all over the world. Its
architecture, admired for its intimate scale and sensitivity to
the surrounding natural environment of the Santa Monica Mountains,
has contributed to its success as an oasis in the urban sprawl of
Los Angeles. Skirball opened the new Ahmanson Hall, allowing for
expanded public programming, and serving as a state-of-the-art facility
for the performing arts, conferences, symposia, and special events.
Construction has begun on The Winnick American Family Heritage Hall,
designed to expand the changing exhibition and children's galleries
of the Museum. With the completion of this phase, the Skirball Cultural
Center--on 15 acres, with 450,000 square feet of built space--will
become the largest Jewish cultural center in North America.
Skirball Cultural Center
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The addition to the center includes a new 30,000 sq. ft. north
building housing the 6,000 square feet multi-purpose Ahmanson Hall
with a surrounding garden. The Hall is designed with the flexibility
to accommodate a banquet for 400 to 500 people or a lecture or music
event with a seating capacity of 800. Events in the hall can extend
into the garden through the glazed, double height west facing wall
which curves 180 degrees from north to south and opens to the garden.
The great hall has specially designed mechanical systems providing
the perimeter with separate zones for local control. Also included
in the addition are a 1,700 square feet mezzanine level, a 1,300
square feet pre-function space and support spaces consisting of
a server kitchen, bathrooms, office space, and storage and equipment
rooms. To address budget concerns, Syska Hennessy Group were able
to utilize existing utility systems from the main campus to supply
the new addition, and included a highly efficient electrical system
that would also provide for future expansion of two other planned
buildings.
The Skirball Cultural Center is the translation of a dream
into a living reality. The dream: outreach by a Jewish institution
to American society as a whole. The living reality: vibrant exhibitions,
concerts, lectures, films, and thriving education programs that
engage the parallel values of Jewish and American experience.
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