After Eli and Edythe Broad's $26 million donation, the MSU Board of Trustees didn't think twice about naming the new art museum after the pair at Friday's board meeting.
As requested by Eli Broad, the name of the building - The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum - will be prominent on all sides of the building.
Exactly how many times will the name be placed on the museum?
That will be determined by the final design of the museum, which will most likely not be a standard, four-sided building.
A competition is being held to design the building, and it's well underway.
With a little under four weeks left, five architectural firms - Zaha Hadid, Coop Himmelb(l)au, Morphosis, William Pedersen and Randall Stout - are racing against the clock to finish their designs and present them to the design team, Eli Broad and other MSU officials.
The location for the presentation has not yet been determined but will take place July 18, said Linda Stanford, associate provost for academic services and project manager of the design team. A representative from each of the firms already has been to campus to look at the site and talk to the design team, said Susan Bandes, museum director.
"It's wonderfully exciting," Bandes said. "We have some of the top architects in the world - to have them focusing on our program and putting their creative ideas to work - it's almost unbelievable."
The design team has five representatives from MSU - Stanford, Bandes, William Latta, assistant director of the office of planning and budgets, Daniel Bollman, an engineer in physical plant engineering planning, and Mark Terman, director of principal gifts from university development.
Stanford does not expect the winner of the competition to be decided on the day of the presentations.
Significant space for exhibition and a building that will standout are some of the main things the design teams are looking for, Stanford said.
"We're looking for a building that will be a work of art in itself," she said. "It's at one of the most important entrances to the campus."
Bandes said she is looking forward to have space and lighting that's appropriate to show works of art.
Because Kresge Art Museum's lighting isn't up to par, she said, when the museum lent collections to other places in the past, the art looked completely different under new lighting.
"We're going to rediscover how fine our collection is," Bandes said.
For now, she and the rest of the museum staff are planning - thinking of gaps in the current art collections and connecting with other museums, sponsors and partners to fill those gaps.
MSU still needs to raise $5 million to meet the cost of the museum.
The museum will be built on the site of the current Paolucci Building, and MSU Provost Kim Wilcox said at Friday's board meeting a small event will be arranged commemorating the legacy of the building.
