The Momentary

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art opened an innovative new arts center in downtown Bentonville. The venue, named the Momentary™, is an adaptive reuse project that transformed a decommissioned Kraft Foods plant south of Crystal Bridges into a multidisciplinary space for visual and performing arts and artists-in-residency. 

Wheeler Kearns Architects, based in Chicago, provided oversight for the adaptive reuse project. Planning was an important part of this project and included identification of programmatic needs and adapt spaces to include galleries, studio space for artists, a small black box theater, an amphitheater, studio kitchen, café, bar and flexible indoor/outdoor community gathering areas. By keeping many of the industrial elements and original finishes of the building, the public spaces feel distinct, yet comfortable and modern.

MCE worked as part of a larger team to re-establish a strong vegetated footprint for the industrial site that was sterile and lacking a unique identity. The ecologically barren site of impervious pavement was improved through the design of gravel pave to function as a pervious load-bearing surface that promotes infiltration and stormwater quality. The on-site parking design drains to an extensive network of bioswales designed to further enhance the quality of stormwater runoff.