建筑师和莱斯大学alumnus Charles Renfro, partner at Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R），返回到休斯顿他的本科母校的校园是为视觉艺术创建跨学科的“外向迷你校园”的校园。该公司将50,000平方英尺的多部门建筑物描述为“艺术生产的机器”，名为Susan和Fayez Sarofim Hall，将直接位于附近迈克尔·马尔桑（Michael Maltzan）建筑-designedMoody Center for the Artsand not too far from the Shepherd School for Music’s Alice Pratt Brown Hall, and the newly completedBrockman Hall for Opera. The new hall will incorporate exhibition areas, studios, shops, labs, faculty offices, and more under a sprawling single roof.
一个明显的透明和com间貌似谷仓的结构posed of pre-engineered steel portals spanning 160-feet, DS+R’s design for Sarofim Hall embraces prefabricated construction techniques and promotes seamless interaction across artistic disciplines while paying homage to Rice’s iconic,now-demolished艺术学院（称为“艺术谷仓”）及其兄弟姐妹结构，稻米媒体中心。
由约翰和多米尼克·德·梅尼尔（Dominique de Menil）委托，分别于1969年和1970年完成Art Barn and Media Center是由当地建筑师设计的霍华德·巴恩斯通和尤金·奥布里大米称之为无处不在的戏剧性进步Butlerbuilding, the mass-produced, pre-engineered metal structures that became popular following World War I.”
在快速剪辑中架起，仅是暂时站立的，简单的木结构，瓦楞金属包装结构，唤起了农业附属建筑，吸引了德克萨斯州乡村的景观，一起用作该景观epicenter of artistic goings-onat Rice for over five decades. In 2014, the Art Barn被夷为平地为了为喜怒无常的中心让路where the Media Center once stood.
“该项目的网站真正独特的是前艺术谷仓和媒体中心建筑的历史 - 两座简单而标志性的金属建筑，其意义不容忽视，”大学建筑师乔治·瑞斯托（George Ristow）说陈述。“DS+R’s initial concept for the new building cleverly weaves the symbolism of that history with the scale, materiality and porosity of the broader campus fabric. With the building being at the outward-facing perimeter—and at an entrance into campus that has evolved into one of the most active and dynamic access points—it will undoubtedly have a different kind of visibility beyond the hedges that will be leveraged as a new and unique gateway to the Rice arts corridor.”
Although details and design renderings of the four-story Sarofim Hall have only just been announced by Rice, DS+R was selected for the $25 million project in 2020 through a national competition. The New York City-based firm is joined by a larger design team that includes, among others,杰克逊和瑞安建筑师in the role of executive architect,OJB景观建筑,Fisher Dachs Associates作为剧院顾问，Threshold监督声学和AV元素。明年的开创性with a target completion date of 2024.
从技术上讲，萨罗菲姆·霍尔（Sarofim Hall）不是DS+R的第一个大米委员会。2014年，该公司是tapped by the university在曾经是停车场的现场设计一个600个座位的歌剧院。该项目的工作最终被推迟了，公司通过设计前阶段将项目迎来了，被取代了艾伦·格林伯格（Allan Greenberg）建筑师for the schematic and design stages. That years-in-the-making, classical-style project, now known as the Brockman Hall for Opera,终于在2017年破土动工and, as mentioned, will be a neighbor of Sarofim Hall.
至于伦弗罗（Renfro），他出生于贝敦市休斯顿（Houston）以外，并于1989年毕业于赖斯（Rice），他在大学的经历是一个跨越的部门。根据休斯顿纪事,he arrived on campus to study music before shifting his focus to art and architecture. (He received his M.Arch in 1994 from the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.)
Renfro在一份声明中解释说：“跨学科的话语是21世纪艺术的标志，但由于其设施分散在校园各地，这在稻米方面一直很困难。”他是稻米学生时不同学科的课程。“萨罗菲姆·霍尔（Sarofim Hall）不仅将首次将这些计划融合在一起，还可以通过使用开放，透明，室内/室外和面向公共的空间来促进学科之间的实验和协作。”
“The building shell is thought of as a piece of infrastructure: simple, durable and timeless, while the insides can transform as needs change,” Renfro added.
Sarofim Hall的主要特征包括玻璃衬里的Artstreet，这是一个充满活力的行人走廊，将建筑物对角线分为二，并用作“米饭和城市之间的桥梁”，“学生，教职员工和公共交流[...]创建一个新的社交社会继承大米拱廊和庭院的DNA的枢纽。”另一个主要的公共面向公众元素是西门廊，这是建筑物的遮蔽室外扩展，它将充当社交前廊，可以举办课程，展览，放映和其他户外节目。
Inside Sarofim Hall, which will provide space for Rice’s Media, Film, Photography, Painting, Print-Making, Drawing, Sculpture, and Performance departments, there are plans for a 230-seat cinema, a suite of flexible presentation halls that incorporate advanced acoustical and technical systems, and a highly adaptable core Performance Space that can be employed for a wide range of performing arts needs while accommodating an audience of 125.
Joining these building-anchoring spaces will be the aforementioned studios, offices, labs, and “dedicated interstitial spaces” that will function as shared work and social zones, per DS+R. “Every space, enclosed or open, indoors or outdoors, serves a purpose in this process: making, thinking, discussing, experimentation and innovation all happen under one roof,” the firm elaborated. “Every wall and niche can become a surface or area for the display of art. The boundaries between disciplines, maker-spaces and exhibition spaces are blurred.”
“With DS+R helming the design of a building that will provide a flexible space for new thinking around the making of contemporary art and performance, Rice will be poised to activate dynamic interdisciplinary as well as interdepartmental collaborations, mindful of the tradition of aesthetics and social justice that the de Menils began locally,” said Bruce Hainley,incoming chair赖斯的视觉和戏剧艺术系。“很快，新建筑将使一个重要的人文科学部能够重新定义自己，而艺术则是大学的中心，这是对休斯顿大社区的最引人注目的邀请网站之一。”
