The Queens Art Museum wanted to double the size of its new exhibit area, creating a unique central sunken gallery with an open layout for displaying large-scale artwork and hosting special events. The museum inhabits a building originally constructed to house the New York City Pavilion at the 1939 World’s Fair. Keeping with the design of the original concrete slabs on ground, Ammann & Whitney and Grimshaw Architects collaborated on this $68-million project to design a polished, colored concrete surface that would be attractive and minimize conventional joints.
As an alternative to conventional temperature-shrinkage steel reinforcement, FORTA-FERRO macro fiber was used at a dosage rate of 7.5 lbs/yd3, along with an integral color additive. The 50,000-square-foot slab areas required approximately 700 cubic yards of fiber-reinforced concrete. Concrete contractor J & A Concrete polished the concrete surfaces for high reflectivity and to eliminate surface-fiber appearance.