The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art said Tuesday that its five-story, 300,000-square foot building and 11-acre campus in Los Angeles’ Exposition Park is now aiming at opening in 2025.
It’s the latest timeline shift for the museum, which first broke ground in March 2018 for a planned 2021 open. Construction and other delays owing to the Covid pandemic forced it in April of last year to move its opening to 2023.
Co-founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson to showcase narrative art via a collection of paintings, illustrations, comic art, photography, film, animation and digital art, the Lucas Museum was designed by Ma Yansong of MAD Architects with Michael Siegel of Stantec as executive architect. Sandra Jackson-Dumont, the museum’s director and CEO, said today that installation has now begun on the more than 1,500 curved fiberglass-reinforced polymer panels to shape the building’s organic, biomorphic surface.
The building itself will house galleries, two theaters, and spaces for learning and engagement, dining, retail and events.
“It’s humbling and energizing to see how all aspects of this new public resource are taking shape,” Jackson-Dumont said. “We believe that narrative art can connect us and help shape a more just society. As a result, every element of this institution contributes to that idea—the site is one physical manifestation of that. The campus with its iconic building and arched belly that creates a canopy, coupled with the 200-plus trees taking root in the park, together create another community gathering place with much needed shade for our neighbors and others who will use the site.”
As for the park and gardens, designed by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA, the first of more than 200 trees are now being put into the ground in a space, formerly a parking lot, that will eventually include an amphitheater, a hanging garden and a pedestrian bridge.
The museum said today that the project has employed more than 4,200 workers.
