By Fay Harvey
PRINCETON, N.J. — The Princeton University Art Museum announced that it will open a new 146,000-square-foot art museum on Oct. 31, 2025.
Located in the heart of the university’s campus, the new three-story space doubles that of the current museum building, encompassing space for exhibitions, education, dining, programming and more.
“This project represents the coming to fruition of dreams that date back thirty years for a museum building that would be worthy of this beautiful campus and our collections and that will serve as a launchpad for exciting future installations and program,” said James Steward, director of the Princeton Art Museum, in a statement.
A Look Inside
Designed by New York-based architecture firms Adjaye Associates and Cooper Robertson, the building will include nine interlocking pavilions, with 80,000 square feet specifically dedicated to gallery spaces that allow museum curators to merge and integrate collections, rather than pursuing the more traditional linear, thematic or chronological methods of display. Offering greater stylistic choice also honors the museum’s cultural exchange effort.
The new Museum features large-scale commissions by artists Nick Cave, Diana Al-Hadid, Tuấn Andrew Nguyễn and Jane Irish, and site-specific sculptural acquisitions by artists Jun Kaneko and Rose B. Simpson. On the “artwalks”, the name for the ground area’s walkways, visitors will encounter works of art, including site-specific sculpture and large-scale paintings. A wood-lined Museum Store sits at its intersection, while inviting outdoor terraces and amphitheaters surround the building.
“We have curated the museum in ways that will welcome visitors not only to experience beauty but also to analyze it; to admire creativity and to contextualize it; to marvel at materials and to complicate their origins,” said Juliana Ochs Dweck, chief curator of the Princeton University Art Museum, in a statement. “Our new museum offers many ways to have intimate encounters with art, to pursue curiosity, engage in meaningful dialogue and to find solace or belonging.”
Educational spaces will comprise approximately 12,000 square feet of the museum, including two creativity labs focused on hands-on art creation. An auditorium, two seminar rooms and six object study rooms will also be reserved for teaching and research. The facility’s multi-use Grand Hall will provide space for up to 265 people, making it the ideal destination for events, performances and gatherings.
Conservation studios for artwork and sculpture protection will be located on the second and third floors alongside their own studio-devoted classroom spaces. The top level will house a full-service restaurant.
Grand Opening
A 24-hour open house is planned for the museum’s opening day, with public events to cement the facility as a community space.
Two initial exhibitions honoring the generosity of donors will feature donated works by Mark Rothko, Joan Mitchell and Gerhard Richter, with ceramic work on display from Toshiko Takaezu, a Princeton professor and abstract artist. Continuing into spring 2026, photographic collections and abstract expressionist paintings will be on display, with an exhibition of work from American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat planned for fall 2026.
“The exhibitions we’ve chosen to inaugurate our new building celebrate collecting, legacy, and the future, and speak to our commitment to reimagine how we curate and present art in this new space,” said Steward in a statement. “As a teaching museum, we have a responsibility to not merely present works by monumental artists of our age or of any age, but to go deeper and grapple with how they arrived at the legacies for which we know them today.”