John Pawson’s design for the newly relocated Design Museum in London will allow it to step up as an international centre for culture and education. The plan has tripled the gallery space, placing it in closer proximity to London’s leading museums, and fundraising has now enabled it to open up its collections for free.
The sweeping pavilion roof – preserved from the original 1960 Grade II listed Commonwealth Institute with the structural expertise of OMA – symbolises its status as an architectural monument to design.
Original concrete floors were removed with radical engineering techniques directed by OMA, Allies and Morrison and Arup, in order to preserve the iconic roof and restructure the buildings into a contemporary design of sweeping simplicity. OMA’s Reinier de Graaf described how they began working on the structure before it had a purpose or owner; when the Design Museum claimed it, ‘a refurbishment became a conversion on to ever more radical degrees’.
The Design Museum's oak-lined atrium. Photography: Gareth Gardner
Pawson then carved the 10,000 sq m space up, making way for a colossal operation of a vast atrium with stepped seating, a permanent gallery, two temporary gallery spaces, a restaurant, auditorium, studios, library, archive, shop and new learning facilities.
The permanent collection – curated into an exhibition titled ‘Designer/Maker/User’ – sits just beneath the roof on the top floor, allowing visitors to see the impressive structure up close as they curve through the energetic exhibition design by Studio Myerscough. By contrast, the gallery at -2 has high ceilings, open space and low display tables, showing the significant effect of architecture on exhibition display and visitor experience.
Pawson’s first major public work displays attentiveness to a purely human recognition of spatial immersion – an absolute requirement for a museum – through the wide atrium, which is combined with a lightness felt in the smooth oak stair and the softly dynamic spiral of the paraboloid roof.
‘Design is about optimism,’ says Sir Terence Conran, who founded the Design Museum in 1983. ‘It’s clean, fresh, well lit, friendly and full of surprises,’ he adds of the design, 'a dream that has been a long time materialising’ and the most important moment of his design career.
Inside, the hyperbolic paraboloid roof is a focal point throughout the space.
Warm oak panelling brings a calming feel to the interiors.
The roof was renovated and restructured by OMA.
The original facade has been rebuilt with double glazed glass
INFORMATION
For more information, visit the Design Museum website
ADDRESS
Design Museum
224–238 Kensington High Street
London W8 6AG
-
The best Ruth Asawa exhibition is actually on the streets of San FranciscoThe artist, now the subject of a major retrospective at SFMOMA, designed many public sculptures scattered across the Bay Area – you just have to know where to look
-
Spend the night at architect Geoffrey Bawa’s former home in ColomboThe godfather of Tropical Modernism’s Number 11 residence now features a brand new guest suite furnished with the Sri Lankan architect’s very own curios
-
London’s best pizza restaurant gets a new home in MayfairSecure a slice of New York-style pizza in central London as Crisp Pizza teams up with the Devonshire pub to set up shop in the relaunched The Marlborough
-
Tour this compact Kent Coast jewel of a cabin with StudiomamaJack Mama and Nina Tolstrup take us on a tour of their latest project – a small but perfectly formed Kent Coast cabin in Seasalter, UK
-
Boutique London rental development celebrates European courtyard livingLondon design and development studio Wendover unveils its newest residential project, 20 Newcourt Street, comprising nine apartments; we toured with co-founder Gabriel Chipperfield
-
A refreshed Fulham house balances its history with a series of 21st-century interventionsA Fulham house project by Bureau de Change creates a 21st-century domestic haven through a series of contemporary interventions and a deep connection to the property's historical fabric
-
The Monthly Architecture Edit: Wallpaper’s favourite July housesFrom geometric Japanese cottages to restored modernist masterpieces, these are the best residential projects to have crossed the architecture desk this month
-
Visiting an experimental UK home: welcome to HousesteadThis experimental UK home, Housestead by Sanei + Hopkins, brings together architectural explorations and daily life in these architects’ own home
-
A house in Leamington Spa is a domestic oasis infused with contemporary sensibilitiesThis house in Leamington Spa, by John Pardey Architects, brings together flood risk considerations, a conservation area's historic character, and contemporary sensibilities
-
A garden explaining carbon capture in nature? Head to Kew in LondonKew unveils 'Carbon Garden', a new offering at London's Royal Botanic Gardens that's all about carbon capture within nature; and how plants and soil can be leveraged to help us battle climate change
-
An old war barracks is transformed into a charming Dorset Beach HouseNestled in its coastal setting, a redesigned barracks home in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty becomes a contemporary Dorset beach house by Architecture for London
