The Princeton University Art Museum has announced it will open its highly anticipated new building to the public on Friday, October 31, 2025, following a multi-year design and construction process first announced in 2018. Designed by Adjaye Associates, in collaboration with executive architect Cooper Robertson, the 44,500 m2 (146,000 sf) teaching museum will effectively double the available spaces for display, learning, gathering, and visitor amenities. Sitting at the heart of Princeton University’s historic campus, the building embodies the institution’s long-standing commitment to serve as a nexus for the arts and humanities, a community gathering place, and a public gateway to the University’s intellectual resources.
The three-story structure consists of metal components in its facade. It is shaped around nine interlocking pavilions, devoting 7,432 m2 (80,000 sf) to gallery display, with the vast majority of these spaces located on a single level. The Museum’s ground floor features entrances at all sides of the building, inviting those traversing campus to utilize two interior “artwalks”, themselves embedded with works of art, including site-specific sculpture and large-scale paintings.
The museum simultaneously announced its inaugural season of special exhibitions, along with the curatorial approach to the display of its globe-spanning collections, now numbering over 117,000 objects and representing five thousand years of human creativity.
Over 1,114 m2 (12,000 sf) is dedicated to education, including two creativity labs for hands-on artmaking, six object study classrooms, an auditorium, two seminar rooms, and the stunning Grand Hall, a space which can be transformed to accommodate teaching for up to 265, performances, large events, or informal social gathering. State-of-the-art conservation studios with their own classroom space are located on the Museum’s second and third floors, while a full-service restaurant boasting indoor and outdoor dining is located on the third floor. A wood-lined Museum Store sits at the intersection of the two artwalks. Several outdoor terraces and an outdoor amphitheater round out the perimeter of the project, offering more possibilities for visitors to engage with the museum’s robust schedule of public programs.
The museum will inaugurate the space with two special exhibitions honoring the vision and generosity of those connected to its recent history. Princeton Collects highlights transformative works of art donated during the new museum’s opening, including major paintings by artists such as Mark Rothko, Joan Mitchell, and Gerhard Richter. Toshiko Takaezu: Dialogues in Clay positions the ceramic art of the abstract artist and Princeton professor within an array of experimental artistic exchanges between the artist, her contemporaries, and her teachers.
The inaugural season continues in spring 2026 with Willem de Kooning: The Breakthrough Years, 1945–50, which concentrates on the essential generative years for the abstract expressionist painter and Photography as a Way of Life, exploring midcentury photographic modernism through three figures central to the age, Minor White, Aaron Siskind, and Harry Callahan. An exhibition of the work of iconic American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat is planned for fall 2026.
Following a 24-hour open house that kicks off Friday, October 31, 2025, with a roster of free and public events designed to activate the Museum’s new spaces, visitors can look forward to a full schedule of public programming throughout the season.
