Griffin Museum Welcome Hall Reopens Its Front Door

Chicago's Griffin Museum of Science and Industry is about to get a front door worthy of the building behind it. Robert A.M. Stern Architects, known as RAMSA, unveiled plans on October 27, 2026, for a new Griffin Museum Welcome Hall that reopens the museum's historic North Portico as a year-round entrance. The proposal replaces a long underground arrival with a direct walk at ground level, and it restores a ceremonial approach that the building has not offered as its main entrance in years. For a museum that draws families, school groups and tourists to Chicago's South Side, the change is as much about access as it is about architecture.

The problem the Griffin Museum Welcome Hall solves is easy to picture. Right now, visitors enter through largely subterranean spaces and must navigate more than one hundred stairs and two elevators to reach the exhibition areas, according to the project team. That journey takes approximately eighteen to twenty-five minutes. The proposed entrance cuts the arrival to four to seven minutes by establishing a direct route at ground level, without stairs or elevators along the main path. The difference matters most for visitors using wheelchairs, pushing strollers or managing a group of children, but a shorter and clearer arrival improves the visit for everyone.

What the new entrance changes

The Griffin Museum Welcome Hall is a low, sweeping structure set below the historic building's plinth, designed to sit quietly in the landscape rather than compete with it. Inside, a large central gathering space anchors the plan, with projecting wings holding restrooms and other publicly accessible spaces. A continuously glazed facade and a skylight bring daylight deep into the interior, while building systems stay largely concealed within the projecting arms to keep the architectural form clean. Chicago Urbanize reported that the city's Plan Commission has approved the proposal, a step that moves the project from rendering toward reality.

The Griffin Museum Welcome Hall also changes the landscape around the museum. New Science Gardens will sit between the Griffin Museum Welcome Hall and the museum itself, offering areas for public programming and gathering that remain accessible without museum admission. Combined with the hall and its glass connector, the landscape work turns what is now a secondary entrance into a more open civic space. The museum said the project answers community requests for a building that feels more welcoming, more accessible and more connected to the people it serves, and the design keeps that promise visible from the street.

A glass link to a historic facade

The building at the center of the project carries serious history. It began life as the Palace of Fine Arts for the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893, and its limestone facade and classical details remain protected. The Griffin Museum Welcome Hall respects that history by keeping its distance in spirit while connecting in glass. A highly transparent connector with structural glazing and bird-safe glass will join the new hall to the historic building, giving visitors a light-filled and accessible route to the North Portico while letting them experience the original ceremonial approach.

Behind the portico columns, glass curtain walls will form the new entrance frontage, and the center of the portico stairs will be carved out to create an accessible entrance directly through the historic structure. Restoring the historic grade means all visitors will enter through the same primary point of access, rather than some visitors using a grand front and others a side route. ArchDaily reported that the proposal forms part of a master plan completed by RAMSA in 2024 that examines how the museum uses its existing exhibition and public areas. Renderings for the project were produced by Alden Studios, according to Construction Review Online. The Illinois historic preservation office holds a conservation easement on the building, according to its July 2026 letter on the project.

What happens to the old entrance

Moving the entrance above ground frees the space below it for a second life. The existing underground entry hall is planned for exhibition use once the Griffin Museum Welcome Hall opens, giving the museum new gallery space without expanding its footprint. That kind of reuse fits the Griffin Museum Welcome Hall as a whole: rather than building outward, the plan reorganizes what already exists so the historic building works better for contemporary crowds. The museum's current entrance route, with its stairs and elevators, becomes gallery floor instead of a bottleneck.

The project also sits alongside a related investment in the building's other face. A twenty-two million dollar renovation of the South Portico is already part of the museum's wider program, according to Construction Review Online. Taken together, the two portico projects treat the building as a whole, giving both its lake-facing and park-facing sides the attention a landmark of this age requires. For visitors, the practical result is a museum that can be entered, navigated and enjoyed without the long underground detour that defines arrival today.

What is still undecided

Not every detail of the Griffin Museum Welcome Hall is settled. Construction Review Online reported that the construction cost and the groundbreaking date have not been announced, so the timeline from approval to opening day remains open. That is normal for a project of this scale on a protected historic building, where preservation review, fundraising and construction sequencing all take time. The design itself, however, is now public, and the approval gives the museum a clear direction for the next phase of work.

For readers following design this autumn, the museum project sits alongside recent coverage of dopamine decor and the coastal grandmother look, two very different answers to the same question of how a space should feel. The Griffin Museum Welcome Hall answers it with daylight, level thresholds and a restored front door. If the project proceeds as approved, the next generation of museum visitors will arrive the way the building's first visitors did, through the portico, at street level, with the museum opening directly ahead of them. That is a fitting return for a palace built to welcome the world.