The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Vaux's Gothic Original and Hunt's Beaux-Arts Front

The Beaux-Arts Fifth Avenue facade of the Metropolitan Museum of Art with paired columns and arched windows

The Fifth Avenue facade of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photograph by Epicgenius, via Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 4.0.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art opened at its present site in Central Park on March 30, 1880, in a Gothic Revival building by Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey Mould. The Beaux-Arts front on Fifth Avenue that visitors recognize came later. It was designed by Richard Morris Hunt, and its Great Hall opened in December 1902. The Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the museum on June 9, 1967.

How did the Met begin?

The Met says the idea was born on July 4, 1866, with John Jay, in Paris. The museum was incorporated on April 13, 1870, and it first opened in the Dodworth Building in Manhattan before moving to Central Park.

Oval portrait of Calvert Vaux, a bearded man in a bow tie — Calvert Vaux. Unknown photographer, via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.

Who designed the first building?

The first unit at Fifth Avenue was begun in 1874, the Landmarks Preservation Commission says, and it was designed by Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey Mould in a Ruskinian Gothic style. It opened on March 30, 1880. The Met says the west facade of that building survives, inside the Lehman Wing, while the rest of the early structure was built over.

What did Richard Morris Hunt add?

Hunt designed the Fifth Avenue facade and the Great Hall in the Beaux-Arts style. The Met says the facade and hall opened in December 1902. Hunt died in 1895, and his son Richard Howland Hunt finished the work. The Landmarks Preservation Commission notes that sculpture groups planned for the facade were intended but never made.

Pen portrait of Richard Morris Hunt seated at a desk — Richard Morris Hunt, half-length portrait seated at desk. Library of Congress, via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.

How did the museum grow?

The firm McKim, Mead & White added wings in 1911, 1913, 1916 and 1926. The Old Assay Office facade, built in 1823, was taken down and re-erected in the American Wing, and the commission's designation covers it. The architect Kevin Roche carried out a master plan that ran from 1971 to 1991, according to the Met's own history of the building.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art seen across Fifth Avenue near 81st Street in an early twentieth century photograph, with a street lamp and parked cars

The Metropolitan Museum of Art with the obelisk, Fifth Avenue and 81st Street. Irving Underhill, Library of Congress, via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.

In May 2021 the museum installed a plaque acknowledging Lenapehoking, the homeland of the Lenape people,.

Who owns the Metropolitan Museum of Art today?

The building belongs to the City of New York. The Met's own overview says the complex in Central Park is city property and that the city provides heat, light and power, while the Trustees of the museum operate it. The museum occupies the building under an 1878 lease with the city, and the Met signed an amendment to that lease in 2013.

Sources

Visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Address: 1000 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10028.
Hours: Sunday to Tuesday and Thursday 10 am to 5 pm, Friday and Saturday 10 am to 9 pm. The Met is closed Wednesday.
Closed days: Thanksgiving, December 25, January 1 and the first Monday in May.
Admission: The Met says admission is pay what you wish for New York State residents and for students from New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, with conditions listed on its admission page.

Checked against the Met admission page and its Met Fifth Avenue visit page. Confirm hours and ticket rules there.