Portland Museum of Art Buys Downtown Building as Expansion Plans Advance
The Portland Museum of Art (PMA) in Maine has added a new piece of real estate to its long-term growth strategy: a downtown building and two adjacent parking lots, purchased late last month for $14 million. The property, formerly owned by MaineHealth, sits next to the museum and is expected to become the new home for PMA’s administrative offices.
The move is designed to free up room inside the museum’s main building for additional galleries, a practical step that aligns with PMA’s broader effort to reshape its footprint in Portland’s Arts District. In a statement Wednesday, Marcie Parker Griswold, head of communications for the museum, called the acquisition “a milestone for PMA,” adding that it would help the institution “grow in place” and create “a more accessible and cohesive home for the arts in the center of Portland.”
The purchase is only one part of a larger expansion campaign. PMA is also developing a new wing that would more than double its footprint and add gallery space, a performance space, a photography center, and a rooftop terrace. To make way for that project, the museum demolished the former Children’s Museum building at 142 Free Street, which it acquired in 2019.
That new wing carries an estimated cost of $100 million and is being designed by LEVER Architecture, which won an international design competition for the commission. Together, the property acquisition and the planned addition suggest a museum preparing not just for more space, but for a different kind of institutional presence in the city — one that is more integrated, more visible, and built to accommodate a larger public role.
