Kulapat Yantrasast delivering remarks at the press opening of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing at The Met.
(Photo courtesy of WHY Architecture and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.)
Kulapat Yantrasast is one of the most in-demand architects working today, especially in the realms of museum design and cultural architecture.
This spring, his global reputation reached new heights with two major milestones: the opening of his redesigned Rockefeller Wing at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the announcement of a new commission at the Louvre in Paris—the museum’s most ambitious gallery renovation in a decade.
As founder of the multidisciplinary studio WHY Architecture, Kulapat leads projects from Los Angeles and New York to Paris, shaping how people experience art, culture and public space across continents. In this conversation, he shares the philosophies that guide his practice—exploring how architecture can become a bridge between cultures, a tool for designing empathy, and a force for deeper human connection.
Your redesign of the Rockefeller Wing at The Met opened to the public in May 2025. What did it mean to you personally to work on a project that presents art from five continents and eight millennia of human history?
It meant a great deal. As someone born in Thailand, who grew up in Japan and not in the U.S., I'm always an immigrant—moving from one place to another. I really feel the need for us to understand one another, to appreciate not only our own art, but also other people's cultures. Museums like The Met are important venues where understanding and empathy can develop.
I see myself as a matchmaker between art lovers and artists, so I want to create an environment that makes the art feel as inspiring and uplifting as it can be. I want visitors to feel comfortable, open and happy, so they can explore something they might not have seen or understood before.
How does the new design help visitors connect with the art?
Kulapat Yantrasast: One of the challenges is that many of these works are extremely light-sensitive. The typical solution is to put them in a dark room with spotlights—like a jewelry store. But that approach can imply the work is mystical or from a dark culture. It colors the understanding of the material.
The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
(Photo courtesy of WHY Architecture and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.)
We all have backgrounds and biases. Before you even see something, you've already formed a conclusion. So when you look, you're often confirming your own understanding. We tried to elevate the art—putting it on the same platform you would give to Western art, Greek and Roman antiquities or contemporary pieces.
Discovery is a big part of my belief system. I don't see museums as places of education, though they serve that purpose. For me, they're gold mines of discovery. You can come across a work of art—maybe from Africa, ancient America or Europe—and it might show you something about your life, about the human condition. Museums are where those discoveries can happen.
You have talked about architecture as more than building design. What do you mean by that?
Everything in our practice is creative. It's not just the design of the building; it’s the experience of the design, how we think about programming, functions and everything in between. In architecture school, people are encouraged to be creative in form-making, and that's maybe less than 10 percent of the work we do.
Everything else we touch can have even more impact than form. So we need to change how people think about it—just like with food. If you want to be a chef, you need to think beyond the dish itself; you need to think about hospitality, client relationships and the ambience of the restaurant.
It's the same in our work. I spend a lot of time explaining to my team that they can be creative in many different ways. We need to broaden the understanding of architecture beyond form-making, so both practitioners and clients can see the larger impact we can have.
Is that why you named the firm WHY Architecture?
I definitely think a lot about that—why we need to do things, and when it's okay to ask "why not?"
Earlier this year, I was at a symposium in Detroit called The Summit—full of technology people. After my lecture, a guy came up to me and said, "I love the ‘why,’ but I don't like the ‘why not.’" He thought "why not" was too open-ended—that anything could happen.
But I told him it depends on your balance. For some people, it's nine parts "why" and one part "why not." For others, it might be 99 "whys" and one "why not." The "why not" is as important to "why" as "yin" is to "yang." You won't solve the world's problems with logic alone. "Why not" is that little goblet of surprise or creativity that needs to be in there, too. That's how I see my life, as well.
Kulapat Yantrasast.
(Photo courtesy of WHY Architecture.)
What does success look like to you and what have you learned running a global practice?
I think different people have different goals. If making money is your main goal, architecture is definitely not the profession to be in.
When I talk to my team about what success looks like, it comes down to “vie,” which means "life" in French.
"V" is Value on investment. It's not just profit, per se. If we invest our labor and our client's money into a project, what's the value we're trying to get out of it? That's something we need to define and measure, for both the client and ourselves.
"I" is Impact. Are we making an impact on the city, the community, children—on the things we care about?
"E" is Excellence. Are we moving the needle professionally? Are we offering something others can learn from?
I always measure projects through this framework. And I also ask: are we making a profit? Because we have to. I know some people don't like to talk about that, but it's important. I want to pay my staff well; I want them to be able to travel and imagine a better world. But they can only do that if they're compensated fairly. These are the things I think about when I measure success on projects.
How do you win those projects?
We hear about many opportunities, and often we're invited without even knowing a project is coming. It's a tough business because we work mostly on public projects, so these are almost always international competitions, not local ones. For 99 percent of our projects, we're competing with the best firms from around the world. It's exciting, but it demands a huge investment.
We're usually given some money to develop a design and proposal, but we spend four times more—on the video, models, design iterations, presentations, you name it. And when you win, you only get the project fee.
The bigger your network, the more expensive it gets. Pursuing a project in Europe means flying staff to the site, covering travel, lodging, food and teaming up with local partners. If you lose, you've sunk that investment. If you win, you get paid for the work itself.
It looks glamorous—big constructions, landmark buildings—but our fees are relatively small, and the risk during and before construction is real. I had a project in Russia that entered construction after three years of work; and then it stopped. You invest financially and emotionally, and suddenly it disappears. You have to stay nimble to navigate these changes and brave whatever happens.
How do you stay connected to your team while managing such a global operation?
To be honest, it's something I still struggle with. You need to be able to delegate well to grow. You can't be a control freak.
Some people are very successful at being able to control every aspect of their practice, and I admire that. But I need to balance being in control with allowing everyone in my organization to grow. They need to have some sense of exposure and sun, so I can't overshadow them all the time. I know that if they are better at what they do, it makes my job easier.
What I try to do is stay in touch with the six or seven directors I work with closely. When I'm in LA or New York, I host a dinner or lunch for everyone, to break bread and catch up. And if they have anything they want to talk about, my door is always open. It helps people see that we're not a hierarchy-focused organization.
As your work reaches wider audiences, what ideas do you hope to bring into the broader cultural conversation?
More and more, people are asking me to speak about my point of view outside of architecture. When it comes to empathy, and even peace, those are things I care deeply about. I try to use my work to support those values and move the needle.
I've talked about my work in museums, art and culture, but I also want to talk about how culture is the key to life. If I'm able to speak more to that, I hope it will attract clients who identify with those values.
When you think about the wealth of the world and the amount of excellence in design and culture we're making, it's actually quite low compared to other times in history. And when you see our cities getting more complicated, more dense and sometimes even uglier, how do we change that?
Especially here in America, one of the wealthiest countries in the world, we still struggle with homelessness, traffic and so many other challenges. We should ask: Are we using our resources to sustain our lives together and build a deeper sense of meaning in how we live?
It's a grand way of looking at culture and life, but it's necessary for us to mature together.
Rendering of the updated Roman Antiquities Trail in the Sphinx Courtyard at the Louvre.
(Photo courtesy of WHY Architecture.)
You will soon begin work on a major redesign at the Louvre. How do you approach a project with that much history, and what do you hope to achieve?
The opportunity to work with the Louvre on the new department is a chance of a lifetime. In my view, the new department represents the most critical period within the most important area of the history of the world’s civilizations: from the antiquities of the Roman Empire to the birth of religions in the Mediterranean, roughly from 0 BC to 800 AD. The era and cultures represented in our project at the Louvre are highly influential on our geopolitics and cultures today.