Inscription about the founders of the museum, in the Ames Atrium at the Cleveland Museum of Art.

The original Beaux-Arts was designed by the architectural firm of Hubbell & Benes, and opened in June 1916. A Neoclassical addition, designed by the firm of Hayes and Ruth, opened in March 1958 against the original building's north side. The building extended toward the north again in 1971 with a Modernist addition designed by Marcel Breuer. A west wing, designed by the firm of Dalton, van Dijk, Johnson & Partners, opened in 1983.

In 2001, the museum was radically changed by architect Rafael Viñoly. The 1958 structure, which had never really worked well, was demolished. The courtyard this demolition created was covered with a glass-roofed atrium. Gallery and museum store space was added to the "interior" wall of the Breuer wing, an east wing was constructed, and a "wrap-around" connecting the east and west wings and enfolding the north wing helped link it all together.

The east wing opened in 2009, and the north wing and atrium in 2012. The west wing opened on January 2, 2014.

The atrium was named for Cleveland businessman and philanthropist B. Charles "Chuck" Ames and his wife, Joyce "Jay" Eichhorn Ames, who donated $20 million to the museum's reconstruction.