MIT will mark the opening of its renovated Metropolitan Storage Warehouse on Sept. 8 with a ceremonial moving-in procession for the School of Architecture and Planning.
MIT reported that architecture firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro led the redesign of the 500-foot-long Cambridge facility. Built in stages starting in 1894 and completed in 1923, the five-story warehouse previously housed 1,500 private storage units across roughly 220,000 interior square feet behind two-foot-thick brick walls. The school previously operated from divided spaces across MIT Buildings 7 and 9.
Diller Scofidio + Renfro divided the structure across its five sequential construction segments. Each segment contains double-height, column-free studios suspended from roof trusses that transfer structural loads down into the existing framework.
Exterior modifications and studio design
Contractors carved large openings into the warehouse's long north side, which borders railroad tracks, replacing sections of brick with expansive glass facades. Founding partner Elizabeth Diller cited the 1970s structural cuts of artist Gordon Matta-Clark as an aesthetic influence for opening the dense masonry mass. Associate architects Leers Weinzapfel Associates and builder Shawmut Design and Construction tested slab cuts on site to preserve exposed cross-sections of original brickwork as interior visual features.
The Cambridge Historical Commission asked MIT to leave the south and east exterior walls intact. That restriction preserved the historic painted sign reading “Metropolitan Storage Warehouse Fire Proof,” which faces Boston across the Charles River. To bring daylight into south-facing offices and seminar rooms, architects installed steel-framed box windows that intersect original narrow window slits while carrying the structural weight of the brick and stone sills.
Corridors and project funding
Internal walkways on each floor link the large northern studios to the southern offices. MIT planned these paths to extend the circulation model of the campus Infinite Corridor, an indoor hallway spanning one-sixth of a mile. Open central staircases cut through the building to connect the walkway system across all five floors.
The warehouse houses the MIT Morningside Academy for Design, which was established through a $100 million gift from the Morningside Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the T.H. Chan family. Donors Gerald, Beryl, Ronnie, and Barbara Chan contributed funding that supported the building renovation. Global consulting firm Sidara, owned by Maha and Talal Shair, funded the construction of the building's auditorium and gallery spaces.
