MAD architects’ Lucas Museum is a “futuristic spaceship” in L.A.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by MAD architects in Los Angeles - © 2025 Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. Photo courtesy of Hathaway Dinwiddie. Photo by Pedro Ramirez.

Architecture – In Los Angeles, MAD Architects is completing the striking, fluid architecture of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, reflecting on cinema, illustrated storytelling, and cultural imagination across disciplines. “I am an avid architectural fan, and I wanted a special museum that was a work of art in itself.” Said George Lucas, the iconic filmmaker of Star Wars, Indiana Jones and more. The museum was built on the belief that illustrated storytelling is a universal language. “Stories are mythology, and when illustrated, they help humans understand the mysteries of life.”

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Its permanent collection brings together more than 40,000 works, from Star Wars artefacts to impressionist paintings, forming one of the world’s most significant collections dedicated to illustrated storytelling and popular visual culture across centuries. “This is an art museum, but I’m also trying to position it as an anthropological museum.” Said Ma Yasong, founder of MAD Architects.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by MAD architects in Los Angeles - © 2025 JAKS Productions. Photo courtesy of USC School of Cinematic Arts. Photo by Roberto Gomez.

Spanning 300,000 square feet, the Lucas Museum embodies the studio’s signature language through fluid, futuristic forms shaped like a landed spacecraft. The five-storey building is clad with fibreglass-reinforced polymer (FRP) panels. “Ma Yansong’s architectural vision creates a building which is an organic sculptural form in a park that pushes the boundaries of architecture and creates a sense of wonder,” said museum representatives.

Visitors enter through an expansive cave-like atrium, animated by daylight pouring from skylights above and opening toward the surrounding parkland. Thirty-five galleries unfold across 100,000 square feet, each named after shared human experiences, including love, family, community, play, work, adventure, and childhood.

“It is my feeling that popular art is an insight into a society and what they aspire to; what they really want, what they really are – it is about telling the narrative of their story, their history and their belief system.” Explains Ma Yasong.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by MAD architects in Los Angeles - © 2024 Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, photo by Jenny Miyasaki.

Throughout the galleries, visitors rediscover familiar illustrations, mural paintings, comic art, science fiction imagery, and children’s books that define 20th- and 21st-century culture. Cinematic artefacts, movie posters, and documentaries featuring artists and filmmakers extend the narrative.

“I believe all kinds of art have a right to exist,” continues Yasong. “I think it’s important to have a museum, that I used to jokingly say, supports all the orphan arts that nobody wants to see, but everybody loves. So that’s my dream for this.”

Public life remains central to the Lucas Museum, with the first floor and roof conceived as open civic spaces encouraging rest, movement, and connection. The museum will also feature two state-of-the-art theatres, numerous dedicated spaces for learning and engagement, restaurants, retail, and event space. Developed in collaboration with Stantec, the 11-acre campus is embraced by an extensive new green space by Studio-MLA.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by MAD architects in Los Angeles - © 2025 JAKS Productions. Photo by Sand Hill Media/Eric Furie.

Rooted in narrative, landscape, and public generosity, the project proposes architecture as shared myth, inviting visitors to move, reflect, and imagine together, beyond disciplines, hierarchies, and conventional museum boundaries.