The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has given a remarkable new purpose to one of Cambridge’s historic industrial buildings. The university has completed the transformation of the century-old Metropolitan Storage Warehouse, creating a new home for its School of Architecture and Planning (SA+P).
The former warehouse has been converted into a light-filled environment dedicated to teaching, research and public engagement. Stretching more than 500 feet in length and rising five stories, the imposing brick structure had been a familiar Cambridge landmark for more than a century.
“It’s almost inconceivable that this brick box, which was not designed for human habitation but to store objects, has been opened up,” said Professor John Ochsendorf in MIT’s news release.
Known simply as the “Met”, the building was originally constructed in 1894. According to architecture studio Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R), which led the transformation, four additional sections were added by 1911 before the building reached its current form in 1923. MIT acquired the property in 1962, and by 2015 it was no longer being used for storage.
From a fortress-like warehouse to an academic centre
The original building was designed with security and protection in mind. DS+R describes its atmosphere as resembling a fortress, with two-foot-thick walls, corner towers, crenellated corbeled cornices and narrow slit windows.
At the time, the warehouse was promoted as “fireproof” and was intended to protect valuable possessions belonging to some of Boston’s wealthiest families. Its contents included bronzes, pianos, carriages, furs and other treasured objects.
Transforming that highly enclosed environment into a modern academic facility therefore required far more than a conventional renovation.
The revitalised building is now described by MIT as “a remarkable feat of architecture, engineering, and ‘adaptive reuse.’” The project incorporates four sections of glass walls, double-height studios, extensive shared spaces and walkways running the length of all five floors.
These elevated circulation areas overlook the workspaces below and provide what MIT calls a 21st-century variation of the “Infinite Corridor” found in the university’s main group of buildings. The new facility is also targeting LEED Gold certification.
A long-term vision for SA+P
The transformation grew out of a vision developed in the late 2010s by Hashim Sarkis, then Dean of MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning, together with his collaborators.
Their objective was to establish a dedicated environment at MIT for architecture, design and planning — one that could bring together teaching, research and collaboration under one roof.
“This is a big statement on the part of MIT,” Sarkis said. “I think it sends a very good message that this vanguard school of architecture, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is moving into a historic building and adapting it for the future.”
For DS+R, however, the central challenge was particularly demanding: the architects had to create a building designed for people while preserving the imposing character of its historically designated façade.
An industrial structure redesigned from the inside
The original structure offered considerable strength, but few of the qualities required for a contemporary academic environment.
DS+R points out that the building’s floor system could support loads of 150 pounds per square foot, while its large freight elevators were capable of handling the daily demands generated by students and faculty. Yet the Met had been designed for objects rather than people.
Its low floor-to-floor heights, closely spaced columns and lack of windows created dark, compartmentalised spaces with limited access to natural light and fresh air — conditions poorly suited to academic work and even less appropriate for creative disciplines.
“Reconciling SA+P’s pedagogical aspirations with this industrial-age monolith presented both opportunities and seemingly insurmountable challenges,” DS+R explains on its project website.
The solution involved what the studio describes as a series of carefully planned “cutting strategies”, drawing inspiration from artist Gordon Matta-Clark, whom DS+R calls “the master of architectural surgery.”
The interventions ranged from incising and coring to dismantling and severing sections extending across multiple floors.
Those operations were not simply aesthetic. By removing parts of the existing structure and introducing new support systems, the architects were able to redistribute loads throughout the building and create the larger, more open spaces required by the school.
Cutting into the past to make room for the future
One of the most significant interventions involved removing portions of the building’s heavy and archaic masonry floor system.
“By creating the necessary high-ceiling studio spaces through the removal of portions of the heavy, archaic masonry floor system, the structural load imposed on the existing columns and wood piles was significantly reduced,” DS+R said.
That reduction uncovered enough reserve capacity within the original structure to accommodate new lightweight floor slabs.
These modern slabs are “hung” from beams using steel straps, with those beams in turn supported by the building’s existing columns and wood piles.
The decision to saw-cut into the warehouse also had an educational purpose. Rather than concealing the building’s transformation, DS+R intentionally exposed different layers of its history.
The architects explain that the techniques used in the adaptive-reuse project were designed to support a pedagogical objective: exposing the building’s historical layers and allowing students to see directly how a structure once considered uninhabitable can be given a new life.
Elements including the fortress-like corner towers and crenellated corbeled cornices were retained. At the same time, larger windows were introduced through the building’s two-foot-thick walls, dramatically changing the relationship between the interior and the outside world.
119,000 square feet of interconnected academic space
The result is a series of carved-out spaces forming a bright, open interior that is almost free of columns. The completed facility covers 119,000 square feet and incorporates makerspaces, academic areas, research facilities, community spaces and offices.
These functions are spread across the five interconnected structures, or “blocks”, that make up the Met. MIT refers to these sections as “neighbourhoods”.
Within each one, DS+R has inserted a long-span sequence of studios suspended from the existing roof. Together, these interventions reduce the visual scale of the enormous warehouse while creating flexible environments for teaching and creative work.
“The residual cellular structure surrounding these stacks is used for offices, meeting rooms, classrooms, and other programs,” the architecture firm explains.
The four departments that make up MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning will share the new environment, creating what DS+R describes as “a shared sense of intimacy and purpose” intended to encourage collaboration between disciplines.
A new life for an old logistics building
The project demonstrates the potential of adaptive reuse to transform buildings originally created for a single industrial purpose into modern workplaces and educational environments.
In the case of the Metropolitan Storage Warehouse, a structure designed more than a century ago to protect physical possessions has become a centre for architecture, design, planning, research and collaboration.
MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning will formally dedicate its new home on October 1. The opening marks not only a major milestone for the school, but also a striking example of how historic logistics infrastructure can be adapted rather than discarded — preserving its architectural identity while giving it an entirely new role for the future.
