The Museum of Sex is coming to Miami. This week the New York–based institution and Snøhetta revealed they will convert a 32,000-square-foot warehouse in Allapattah into a museum with three galleries, a shop, and a bar. While the Museum of Sex may sound as frivolous as a Tinder hookup, the 20-year-old establishment is known for thought-provoking exhibitions on human sexuality that balance serious historical inquiry with playful engagement. The museum’s first and flagship location is in New York City.
A rendering shared by the firm showds off the low-lying converted warehouse structure, which is fronted by windows lit up in a shade of deep purple giving the building a club-like appearance. Two of the Miami outpost’s inaugural exhibitions include Hajime Sorayama: Desire Machines and Modern Sex: 100 Years of Design and Decency, a survey of products that have facilitated sexy time from the 1920s to the present.
The Hajime Sorayama exhibition is the Japanese artist’s first major solo show in the U.S. Sorayama is known for hyperreal renderings of human bodies, including nine-foot-tall “sexy robot” sculptures that starred in the music video for “Echoes of Silence” by Canadian singer The Weeknd (linked below). The show will also include 20 of Sorayama’s erotic paintings.
In addition to the two exhibitions named above, the new location will host a more expansive version of Super Funland: Journey into the Erotic Carnival, the museum’s permanent, terminally campy immersive experience. The centerpiece of the Miami version is a 40-foot-wide Rococo mermaid tank and performance space, because…Miami.
“We are excited to reach this major milestone in our history and to bring our vision to the vibrant cultural landscape of Miami,” Executive Director and Founder of Museum of Sex Daniel Gluck said, in a press release. “Our inaugural programming perfectly embodies our ambitions to be a thought-provoking forum around sex and sexuality, and to bring forth a unique, publicly loved, and critically acclaimed cultural offering to Miami.”
This Florida project is far from the only cultural project Snøhetta has worked on this year. In March the firm revealed it will lead a $100 million revamp of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra’s Powell Hall. The following month it shared a first look at reimagined Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College. In August, the firm showed off SUMMIT, an immersive attraction within KPF’s One Vanderbilt in Midtown Manhattan.
The Museum of Sex Miami is set to open next year.
