Tisch donates $10M to Met Costume Institute

Met Ball attendees, from left: Lizzie and Jonathan Tisch, Anna Wintour, Madonna and Katy Perry

Loews Hotels chairman Jonathan Tisch and his wife, Lizzie, are donating $10 million for a new gallery in the Metropolitan Museum of Art as part of a major renovation of its 23,000-square-foot Costume Institute, the New York Times reported. While fundraising for the project has been in the works for years (last year’s Gala Benefit organized by Vogue editor Ann Wintour raised around $9 million), the Tisch gift “provided us with the tipping point to move forward,” said Met director Thomas Campbell. The makeover, by Kevin Roche, John Dinkeloo and Associates, will increase the Costume Institute’s gallery and storage spaces, which have been filled to capacity in recent years after the Brooklyn Museum transferred its collection of American and European costumes and accessories to the Met. The cost of the project has not yet been announced, but construction will begin next year and will not require a temporary shutdown of the institute, museum officials said. [NYT]