Editing Beaux-Arts Architecture (section)

== Philadelphia Museum of Art ==

The Philadelphia Museum of Art crowns the Benjamin Franklin Parkway with one of America's grandest museum buildings. Designed by Horace Trumbauer with Julian Abele and C.C. Zantzinger, the museum presents Greek temple forms at monumental scale, its wings extending along Fairmount's ridge to create a classical acropolis overlooking the city. The building's Minnesota dolomite facades, polychrome terracotta roof, and bronze doors required decades to complete (1919-1928), while interior galleries continued to open through subsequent years.<ref name="tatum"/>

The museum's most famous feature—the entrance steps immortalized in the film ''Rocky''—demonstrates Beaux-Arts mastery of processional experience. The ascent from street to plateau creates physical and psychological preparation for cultural encounter, transforming museum visit into ceremonial approach. The building's interior, organized around a great hall and proceeding through period rooms and gallery suites, continues Beaux-Arts principles of hierarchical circulation and varied spatial experience. Recent additions and renovations have respected the building's character while expanding capacity and improving function.<ref name="roth"/>