Diller Scofidio + Renfro Breaks Ground on Rice University’s New Arts Building
Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R) with a team led by Charles Renfro has broken ground on Rice University’s New Arts Building named the Susan and Fayez Sarofim Hall. The new building envisioned as a gateway to the university’s campus will incorporate exhibition areas, labs, studios, shops, faculty offices, and other facilities. To create adaptability over time, the structure uses an expandable prefabricated system, thus incorporating interdisciplinarity and experimentation within the design. The building located in Houston, Texas, is expected to open in the fall of 2025.
The building’s design pays tribute to the mass-produced, pre-engineered metal structures of Art Barn and Media Center, which were commissioned by Houston art patrons John and Dominique de Menil in 1969 when they founded the Institute for the Arts at Rice. Sarofim Hall liberates the steel frame from its skin, transforming the structure into an exterior mini-campus, welcoming students, faculty, and the general public into its covered exterior spaces. Every space and surface, whether indoors or outdoors, serves as a promotor of “making, thinking, discussing, experimentation, and innovation” all under one roof.
Spanning 83,000 square feet, the building anchors one of the university’s growing key departments, the Visual and Dramatic Arts, designed with the potential for additional spatial expansions. As explained by Renfro, “The building shell is thought of as a piece of infrastructure: simple, durable and timeless, while the insides can transform as needs change”. Accordingly, the studios and facilities are designed in a flexible approach, encouraging students to curate their work areas according to their artistic needs.
Related Article
Diller Scofidio + Renfro Unveils Plans to Restore Frank Lloyd Wright’s Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas
DS+R’s design for Sarofim Hall also incorporates a glass-lined pedestrian ArtStreet that divides the four-storey structure and acts as a new entrance to the university, inviting passersby to explore what’s happening inside the new space. According to the architects, the building is designed as a pedagogical tool that can foster collaboration across artistic mediums. The unit will be built adjacent to the Moody Center for the Arts nearby the Shepherd School for Music’s Alice Pratt Brown Hall and the newly constructed Brockman Hall for Opera.
The glass walls allow a two-way dialogue between every program space throughout the entire
length of the building. Photo looks at film, looks at painting, looks at drawing, looks at sculpture, looks at performance art.- Charles Renfro, alumni of Rice University
Recently, Diller Scofidio + Renfro won an international competition to design the new Pina Bausch Zentrum in Wuppertal, Germany, a project created to create harmony between all the different functions contributing to multidisciplinary stage productions. Additionally, the office is collaborating with the Dallas Theater Center to restore one of the lesser-known buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright, the Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas.
