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THE MUSEUM

in Hamburg are ever carried out, the Director's offices there will be the best placed of any museum visited. The arrangement provides for a vestibule from which the public enters directly into the main corridor of the museum. To the left of the vestibule a door leads to the Director's offices and to the right to the lecture hall. Thus it is possible for visitors to be admitted at once to the presence of the Director and to leave again without even entering the main corridor of the building, at the same time using only one front door. The staff, on the other hand, can go from their office into the museum by going out another door which opens into the main corridor.

STAIRCASES

Many mistakes are made in providing monumental staircases. This is undoubtedly due to the fact that our American museums have been copied more or less from European museums, and European museums have been largely adaptations of palaces for museum purposes. Thus, for instance, few buildings have more grand staircases than the Louvre, but that is because the Louvre was a royal palace and grand staircases were intimately connected with the needs of court life. There is an opportunity for the ambitious architect in the wonderful chance to produce an imposing archi-