The steel skeleton of the $400-million Academy Museum is now rising at the LACMA campus, as seen in a drone photograph by Lon Snyder.

The project, which is being built by the Academy of Motion PIcture Arts and Sciences, is being carved into the shell of a former May Company department store at Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue.  The iconic feature of the museum - a glass sphere - is being built immediately north of the historic structure.

Renzo Piano, the Italian architect responsible for some of the most recent expansions of the LACMA campus, is designing the AMPAS Museum.

Expected complete in Spring 2019, the project will create a permanent home for the Academy's collection of films, memorabilia and movie-making artifacts, displayed through a series of galleries and on-site theaters.