Quick answer
The Broad Los Angeles is a contemporary art museum on Grand Avenue in downtown Los Angeles. The audio guide focuses on the veil and vault architecture, the collection storage visible through windows, and the public plaza with olive trees. Listen for details about Eli and Edythe Broad, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and what to look at while visiting.
Full transcript
The Veil and the Vault
The Broad Los Angeles opens with a building idea called the veil and vault. Diller Scofidio + Renfro, working with Gensler, shaped a structure where public galleries and collection storage are not separate afterthoughts. The vault is the heavy opaque mass hovering midway through the building. Its carved underside shapes the lobby below, while its top surface becomes the floor plate for exhibition space. Around it, the veil is an airy honeycomb-like structure that spans the block-long gallery and filters daylight. The design lets visitors sense the depth of the collection through viewing windows into storage. Stand in the lobby, then look up at the vault's underside and trace the honeycomb veil above the plaza edge.
The Collection Behind the Building
The collection is the reason the building exists. Eli and Edythe Broad assembled a holding of contemporary art that reaches from postwar decades to the present, and The Broad presents it as a rotating public resource rather than a fixed display. The museum describes its holdings as almost two thousand works, a leading collection of postwar and contemporary art. The Broad Art Foundation has also lent works to museums and galleries worldwide since nineteen eighty-four, so the galleries are only part of the story. When you enter, notice how the chronological sweep moves from Pop and postwar figures into later acquisitions and immersive installations. Look for the artists named in the introductory wall text, then compare their scale, materials, and mood with the next room.
Plaza, Greenery, and Grand Avenue
Outside the galleries, the museum continues into the East West Bank Plaza, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro with Hood Design Studio. The plaza sits directly south of The Broad and adds green space to Grand Avenue. Its landscaping includes one hundred-year-old Barouni olive trees and an open lawn, giving the block a softer edge than the surrounding downtown streets. The museum also earned a LEED Gold certification in twenty sixteen for energy-saving design features, so the building's sustainability story is part of the visit. Across the street, Walt Disney Concert Hall frames the cultural corridor. Walk south from the entrance, stand beneath the olive trees, and look back at the veil's honeycomb pattern catching daylight.