Today we bring you news not about buildings of concrete and glass, but ones made of gingerbread.

The Museum of Architecture is again welcoming The Gingerbread City in 2025. Opening on November 29 2025, the exhibition invites architects, engineers and designers to create urban landscapes entirely from baked goods – celebrating (and stretching) the creativity of professionals imagining the cities of tomorrow.

This year’s theme, ‘The Playful City’, challenges participants to explore how design can inspire joy – and to consider how curiosity and connection can shape our built environments. While the concept is whimsical, the underlying idea is perfectly serious: to champion ‘play’ as an architectural principle – and a catalyst for wellbeing, creativity and community.

Real-world examples of this include Copenhagen’s Superkilen Park – which celebrates cultural diversity through three colour-coded zones filled with more than 100 objects from around the world – and Bristol’s Hello Lamp Post, an interactive public art project inviting people to text everyday street objects like benches or lamp posts. At The Gingerbread City, architects bring these ideas to life through edible public squares, rewilded rooftops, and buildings that encourage interaction – from a train station that doubles as a skate park to a school where slides connect classrooms.

‘We love choosing themes that get architects dreaming big – and the public smiling. The Gingerbread City 2025 asks how fun, imagination and interaction can shape the future of our urban spaces. It’s about rethinking what cities are for – and reminding everyone that good design can be joyful, inclusive and fun,’ says Melissa Woolford, founder of the Museum of Architecture.

Beyond the exhibition, visitors can take part in workshops to build their own houses, following the theme by crafting a community centre in gingerbread form. There is also a ‘gingerbread button’, created by sponsor and AI design platform Gendo, which lets visitors transform themselves into gingerbread figures. Gendo has also collaborated with participating architects to create gingerbread versions of their real-life projects, blending creativity, technology and play in delicious form.

The Gingerbread City will run from November 29 2025 at The Museum of Architecture at Coal Drops Yard, King's Cross, London

An ABBA anniversary

Melina Keays, Entertaining Director

I went to the ABBA Arena at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park to celebrate the third anniversary of the ABBA Voyage show. The evening was all the more thrilling because actual, real-life ABBA were there (or two of them: Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad). The concert is a technical tour de force imbued with life and joy. The digital versions of ABBA are absolutely mesmerising – you can’t take your eyes off them – and their avatars are accompanied by a live ten-piece band and a spectacular light show. We sang along with them, we danced, we marvelled at the technology, and we reflected on a breathtaking vision of the future of pop performance.

An Arabian night

Tianna Williams, Staff Writer

I have spent the last week discovering the beauty of Jordan. While it was an incredible trip packed with culture, cuisine and exploration, a highlight was staying in the Suncity Camp in Wadi Rum (a valley cut into the sandstone and granite rock in southern Jordan, also known as the Valley of the Moon). Here, you can observe unobstructed desert views, and sleep under the stars.

A sunset soirée

Anna Solomon, Digital Staff Writer

Thursday evening is ‘Live Beats and Bites’ night at Mandarin Oriental Mayfair’s ABar. This week, I ascended to the sleek rooftop haunt for cocktails and Korean and Japanese small plates from chef Akira Back. At the risk of sounding curmudgeonly, DJ Earl The Kid’s pulsating set was a little loud, but we caught up with the atmosphere after incredible pear and ricotta, fig and yuzu, and plum and pomegranate cocktails. The spicy tuna sushi, salmon crudo and foie gras brioche were also delicious, but we decided to sidestep the £84 ‘Wagyu Sando’…

A Big Apple opening

Ellie Stathaki, Architecture and Environment Director

I have had a fantastic couple of days in New York this week, and was lucky enough to be here for the launch of The Met Museum's refreshed Michael C Rockefeller Wing. The exhibits, of course, are fascinating and beautiful, and the venue is glamorous and important. But the sensitive redesign by Kulapat Yantrasast's WHY Architecture really shone too. A morning of powerful and inspiring speeches and wonderful cultural works.

Live music in a library

Sofia de la Cruz, Travel Editor

I saw my friend Hani Hooper perform his own music live for the first time at Reference Point, a library, bookshop and bar within 180 Studios, during an inspiring musical soirée organised by Brief Encounters. Set against the venue’s sleek backdrop, washed in red and blue hues, Hani (fresh off the release of his debut EP, Yes) blended genre-fluid electronic beats with pulsing cello interludes – an introspective soundscape palpitating with urgency.

After nearly 15 years of redesigns, fits, and starts, Angelenos will finally be able to get a peek inside the newly-expanded Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) this summer.

The new David Geffen Galleries, which sweep over Wilshire Boulevard like a concrete amoeba, were designed by the Pritzker prize-winning Swiss architect Peter Zumthor—his first-ever U.S. project.

While LACMA won’t open officially to the public until April 2026, the museum will gradually begin to welcome visitors starting this June via a series of outdoor installations, events, and special previews, plus the opening of a new restaurant and shop.

'We’re excited that visitors from both near and far can begin to experience the impact of this amazing building this year, as we ramp up toward the 2026 grand opening celebration,' said museum director and CEO Michael Govan. 'Harnessing the power of art to console, we also hope to be a part of the spiritual healing of Los Angeles as it recovers from the recent unprecedented fires.'

Critics haven’t always been as generous in their assessment. Zumthor’s design became a lightning rod when its preliminary design, a black organic volume inspired by the adjacent La Brea tarpits, was unveiled in 2013. The critic Christopher Knight called it the 'incredible shrinking museum,' due to the design displacing several of the campus’s existing pavilions, including one by L.A modernist William Pereira. Architectural Record, meanwhile, called the scheme the 'Blob that Ate Wilshire Boulevard.'

Zumthor, who worked along SOM for the LACMA plan, made several revisions to the design, due to concerns it would interfere with paleontological research at the tarpits next door.

'There have been tough moments, when we had to reduce, reduce, reduce,' Zumthor acknowledged in the New York Times.

Despite the setbacks, the 'building and its surroundings will start to come to life' according to a museum press release. In the future, visitors can expect to encounter a special commission by Mexican artist Mariana Castillo Deball, in addition to works by Sarah Rosalena, Pedro Reyes, Liz Glynn, Shio Kusaka, and others. American saxophonist Kamasi Washington, meanwhile, will be staging a series of special performances between June 26 through 28th.

In October 2024, the Museum of Sex, which has been a cult institution in New York for 22 years, opened a second home in Miami (which Wallpaper* previewed in 2022). The 32,000 sq ft converted warehouse was designed by architecture firm Snøhetta, and has become a beacon of open discourse around sexuality, encouraging public awareness, discourse and engagement.

Residing in Miami’s Allapattah district – a stone’s throw from the Miami Design District, one of the most vibrant arts communities in the US – the museum is home to three exhibition galleries housing more than 20,000 artefacts and artworks that make up its permanent collection. Snøhetta, it has said, wanted to create spaces that bring people together, imbued with the levity and fun that characterises the Museum of Sex.

The New York Museum of Sex was founded in 2002, with its flagship location designed by SHoP Architects. It has since launched over 40 exhibitions committed to presenting and celebrating different shades of human sexuality (Dutch studio Droog set up camp there for a 2015 show; controversial Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi Araki featured in 2018).

The executive director and founder of the Museum of Sex, Daniel Gluck, said of the Miami opening: ‘We are excited to reach this major milestone in our history and to bring our vision to the vibrant cultural landscape of Miami. Our inaugural programming perfectly embodies our ambitions to be a thought-provoking forum around sex and sexuality, and to bring a unique, beloved and critically acclaimed cultural offering to Miami.

The inaugural exhibition spotlights Hajime Sorayama, known for his detailed portrayals of feminine robots. The Japanese artist’s first solo show in the US explores the eroticism of human bodies via his signature hyperrealist aesthetic, featuring four large-scale ‘sexy robot’ sculptures.

The Miami outpost is also staging a retrospective of the design and marketing of sexual health products from the 1920s to today. ‘Modern Sex: 100 Years of Design and Decency’ considers the impact of historical sexual health campaigns, from the boom in sexual expression of the ‘roaring twenties’ to the restrictive impact of the Second World War and the sexual counterculture of the 1960s and 70s. It does this via more than 500 artefacts, historical media and medical objects that demonstrate how discourse, packaging and advertising on this topic have been received and controlled throughout history.

Also showing at the Miami Museum of Sex: a scaled-up version of an exhibition that has entertained New York visitors since 2019, ‘Super Funland: Journey into the Erotic Carnival’. This installation, inspired by the eroticism of the carnival (which dates back to the Roman Bacchanal), presents an immersive ‘fairground’ containing 20 sex-themed amusements and games. The Miami iteration of this permanent exhibit also features an otherworldly triptych by Sorayama, measuring 14ft high.

Snøhetta, which has worked on international projects such as the Oslo Opera House, North Carolina State University and the Groupe Le Monde headquarters in France, has found in the Miami Museum of Sex another boundary-pushing project on which to stamp its mark.

museumofsex.com

Showing at the Royal College of Physicians Museum, London, from 23 January 2023, photography exhibition ‘Unfamiliar’ frames clinical objects from the museum’s archives in a compelling new light.

‘Unfamiliar’ at Royal College of Physicians Museum 

Photographer Theo Deproost’s take on the historic clinical tools carefully selected by physician associate Debbie Jegede brings art and science into one common realm, and places unlikely objects at the core of an exhibition. The photographs see snuff boxes, stethoscopes and items unidentifiable to the clinically uneducated eye suspended in an otherworldly cloud of colour and contrast. 

The original objects, from the museum’s clinical and fine art collections, are displayed alongside the images. As co-curators, Deproost and Jegede have ensured they ‘honour the historical significance of the objects whilst also transporting them to a realm beyond any specific time period’, says Deproost. In doing so they have created ‘a new, undefined space for the viewer to study and re-interpret the items’.

‘This exhibition presents something very different for the Royal College of Physicians Museum,’ says Lowri Jones, senior curator of the museum. Using the unfamiliarity of the items as an obvious starting point, Deproost’s photographic style introduces further layers of intrigue. 

Jones considered the unique nature of the exhibition in comparison to previous shows at the museum, valuing the chance to be able ‘to bring together Debbie and Theo’s contrasting medical and artistic backgrounds’. She adds that the exhibition ‘demonstrates how effective collaborations between the arts and sciences can be’.

On where the show sits in relation to his other projects, Deproost says, ‘I have photographed museum collections before, but the collaborative contributions […] have added so much depth and clarity to the final outcome.’

'Unfamiliar' is showing from 23 January – 28 July 2023. A selection of works from the exhibition will also be available to view online.

Royal College of Physicians, 11 St Andrews Place, London, NW1 4LE

history.rcplondon.ac.uk

The Museum of Sex has announced plans to open its first and largest outpost in Miami in spring 2023. The expansion builds on the museum’s flagship space in New York City, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. 

The institution’s most ambitious undertaking yet, the museum will be housed in a 32,000-sq-ft converted warehouse in the Allapattah district of Miami. The building has been designed in collaboration with Oslo-based architecture studio Snøhetta, and will comprise three extensive exhibition galleries, retail space, and a bar. 

The inaugural Miami exhibition programme will include Hajime Sorayama’s ‘Desire Machines’, which marks the Japanese artist’s first major solo museum exhibition in the United States. Known for hyperreal sculptures and illustrations that blur the line between humanity and machines, the artist will exhibit four of his nine-feet-tall ‘sexy robot’ sculptures, which have reached recent acclaim through partnerships with the likes of Dior and The Weeknd.

Also on the opening programme is the historical survey ‘Modern Sex: 100 Years of Design and Decency’; and a large reinterpretation of immersive experience, ‘Super Funland: Journey into the Erotic Carnival’. 

Founded in 2002 in NYC, the Museum of Sex has staged more than 40 exhibitions, which have sought to preserve and celebrate the cultural significance and vibrant complexity of human sexuality. Its exhibitions aim to bridge past and future and strike a balance between sincerity and playfulness, encouraging scholarship, public awareness, discourse, and engagement around sex-related subjects. 

Daniel Gluck, executive director and founder of the Museum of Sex, commented: ‘We are excited to reach this major milestone in our history and to bring our vision to the vibrant cultural landscape of Miami. Our inaugural programming perfectly embodies our ambitions to be a thought-provoking forum around sex and sexuality, and to bring forth a unique, publicly loved, and critically acclaimed cultural offering to Miami.’

museumofsex.com.

Milan's Expo is still one month away, but the very first pavilion dedicated to the universal exhibition - and the only one that will be located in the city centre -  has opened its doors inside Milan's Triennale Design Museum. Entitled 'Arts & Foods: Rituals since 1851', the exhibition takes on the Expo's overarching theme of sustainable food but peers at it with an artistic lens. And the results are, in a word, delectable.

Curated by Germano Celant, the prolific artistic director of the Prada Foundation and curator of Milan's Fondazione Aldo Rossi, the exhibition sprawls across the entire 7,000 square metres of the museum, including its outdoor garden. It's like a never-ending feast of food-related objects, tools, paintings, installations, rooms and ambiences from 1851 to the present.

The first room of the exhibition, dedicated to the period between 1851 and 1948, is the most densely packed, cohesively designed and powerfully conceived. It features a fascinating mix of antique cooking tools, kitchen furniture and butcher stations to real Florentine bars from the early 20th century that have been painstakingly reconstructed, bottle-by-bottle. A magnificent collection of antique silverware, loaned by Milan's famous G. Lorenzi cutlery company, is on show, as are thoughtful portraits of chefs by Monet and Manet and an array of mid-century kitchen accessories.

Other rooms are dedicated to the 1950s, 60s and 70s, as well as to contemporary art's dealings with food. It's a tribute to Celant's profile that he's managed to wrangle top works by major artists such as Andy Warhol ('The Last Supper' and his infamous Campbell's soup cans), Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, Tom Sachs, Marc Quinn and Urs Fischer (whose 'Bread House' smells just a little bit stale after nearly 10 years of circulation), even though their assembly makes less impact than the first historical room. No matter; Paul McCarthy's giant, inflatable ketchup bottle, which has been planted in the centre of the Triennale's lush park like a plastic skyscraper, makes up for it.

Also noteworthy is Gaetano Pesce's site-specific installation (the only one in the whole museum) which features giant pieces of kitchenware on a glass floor along with a group of actors chatting, cooking and fighting (what kitchen hasn't seen that?), all visible by nosy viewers looking up from the floor beneath.

This ambitious exhibit shines the spotlight on Milan's Triennale, shaking up this sometimes sleepy institution just in time for the Expo. Not only is the green garden in full aperitivo action but it also has water in its fountains for the first time in 50 years, thanks to the restoration of Giorgio de Chirico's 'Bagni Misteriosi'.  In tandem with the brimming activity is a proper - and long overdue - restaurant opening up on the museum's first floor that features a balcony overlooking the park.

ADDRESS

Triennale di Milano
Viale Alemagna 6
Milan 20121

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A new museum and centre for culture and community, Bët-bi is to open its doors in Senegal in early 2025, the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation and Le Korsa have announced. Architect Mariam Issoufou Kamara, founder of architecture practice Atelier Masōmī in Niger, has been selected by a jury from a shortlist of four African architectural firms to lead the design.

‘It is a great honour and a privilege to be selected to lead the design of Bët-bi,’ Kamara says. ‘For far too long our region has been a place where cultural wealth is pillaged to profit museum collections. This project is an opportunity to design a new type of space that is inspired by the roots and spiritual legacy of the region. It is a chance to push the boundaries of what defines a museum in the 21st century.’

Bët-bi – or ‘the eye’ in Wolof – will be a state-of-the-art museum in the southwestern part of Senegal, in West Africa, with the 1,000 sq m space comprising an exhibition and events space, a library and community rooms.

The new space will be built using sustainable and traditional methods, and created with local artisans. An emphasis on communal spaces and an inclusive environment will incorporate a nod to the heritage of the area, with a design that pays tribute to the historical significance of the area’s ancient stone megaliths and four Unesco World Heritage sites. Kamara will honour both this local history and the people themselves, who have occupied the area since the 11th century, in her design celebrating the connection they feel with the land, sun and water.

‘We approached this project through a look back at the site’s past,’ Kamara adds. ‘We looked at the history of the Saloum Kingdom very closely and have been absolutely fascinated by its origin story, as a place jointly founded by the Serer and the Mandinka people. The latter are historically a people from the Mali empire, who are known for their monumental architecture. As museums and galleries are a product of our more recent past, it is important for me that the project serves as a bold imperative to continue the recent dialogue around rethinking the typology in order to explore new spatial languages around museums.’

Bët-bi will partner with institutions across Africa to showcase both historic and modern African art as well as act as a temporary space for repatriated objects, until the homes to which they rightfully belong have the ability to conserve them.

‘We are thrilled with Mariam Kamara as the unanimous choice of our distinguished architectural jury,’ says executive director of the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation and founder and president of Le Korsa, Nicholas Fox Weber. ‘Her profound respect for local traditions, keen awareness and knowledge of environmental impact, and eye for visual beauty will result in a building sure to help revitalise the economy of the region, providing the benefits well demonstrated by other new cultural institutions in locations with minimal previous tourism. Bët-bi will demonstrate Josef Albers' maxim of ‘minimal means for maximum effect’ and Anni Albers' faith in ‘art that is universal and timeless’.’

INFORMATION
betbi.org

ateliermasomi.com

After a four year renovation and expansion project, the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) has once again reopened its doors. Selldorf Architects has taken the helm on the project, which now offers four times the amount of gallery space, two levels of galleries and a public park, as well as giving access to stunning views over the Pacific Coast.

The opening marks the culmination of a project which began in 2014, when Selldorf Architects planned to not only increase the gallery space from the existing 10,000 square feet to 40,000 square feet, but also allow for both MCASD’s permanent collections and visiting exhibitions.

Annabelle Selldorf on the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego

‘With the Selldorf expansion, MCASD’s flagship building is, at last, scaled to showcase the work it has collected over the past decades,’ says Kathryn Kanjo, director and CEO of MCASD. ‘Soaring ceilings and natural light allow for inviting displays of the collection alongside lively changing exhibitions. The design honours the Museum’s rich architectural history as it frames distinctive views of the village and the coast, providing an updated space for the art and for today’s audience.’

For principal architect Annabelle Selldorf, the goal was both to install an inclusive spirit in the design, and make the most of the dramatic location on the La Jolla coastline, with new seaside terraces offering views over the Pacific Ocean. ‘The addition to MCASD provides new gallery space to the south of the existing buildings,’ she says. ‘In shifting the centre of gravity and entry sequence, we were able to knit together different geometries and achieve an overall volume of the museum that reads as one and nevertheless respects the presence of architectural expressions of multiple generations of the institution.’

By working in harmony with the location, the design ultimately opens up the gallery to the elements, making for an open and welcoming space. Kanjo adds: ‘The architecture connects the experience of art to the experience of nature in a way that didn’t previously exist. The design rejects the notion of the hermetically sealed white cube and instead brings the outdoors into the museum space. Selldorf Architects has opened up MCASD and let in the light.’ 

INFORMATION

mcasd.org

Argo Factory Contemporary Art Museum & Cultural Centre, the first hub of its kind to be built in Tehran in over 40 years, was completed and due to launch in 2020. Yet due to the pandemic and local political circumstances in Iran, it's only now that the team behind it, Iranian-Austrian architect Ahmadreza Schricker, founder of ASA North, and his client, Pejman Foundation, are able to celebrate its opening.

The project is the ambitious conversion of the 1920s Argo Factory – a 480 sq m brewery in downtown Tehran – into a 1,850 sq m home for the arts. The majestic, beautifully monolithic building complex now spans six gallery halls, an auditorium, a library, artist residency and event spaces, a private studio apartment, retail, and a VIP observation deck – there is even a re-issued Argo non-alcoholic draft beer bar.

The project was part restoration, part new build, as the architecture team, including collaborating architects Hobgood Architects (headed by Patrick Hobgood) who were involved in the project's concept phase, had to balance the tightrope between old and new. The existing foundations had to be reinforced (at places entirely rebuilt) and the brick materiality of the overall complex maintained. At the same time, five new, pitched concrete roof structures now top the centre and a new 70 sq m, concrete-clad structure houses the artist residency areas. 'I do not worship Argo, with its many industrial architectural twins around the world, I love Argo. In 2017, the factory’s roofs were missing and as a sign of respect for the old, we placed five new floating roofs on top of the remaining structure. Natural light flows in from the articulated split between old and new, and the newly inserted structural foundation allows the floating architectural “hats” to give another character to an already strong personality,' explains Schricker. 

Bricks from the original structure were recycled and reused where possible, although in places where the walls are entirely new, a different kind of mortar was used to subtly highlight the difference between time periods across the building's skin. Inside, the exposed brick character of the structure continues in all its glory, providing a tactile, yet neutral enough and versatile backdrop for art display. Meanwhile, a flowing, dramatic, 12m-long staircase becomes a key centrepiece in the main ground and upper gallery floors, created without any middle supports in a feat of poured-in-situ concrete engineering.

Schricker adds: ‘Similar to the roof of the Bazaar of Isfahan, the new floating concrete roofs play multiple roles: as deep skylights, they keep the heat out while filtering the light in for the galleries and they also dance with the neighbouring roofs of downtown Tehran. Lastly, as a symbolic nod or “tip of the hat”, they greet the city' as it welcomes back Argo.

Previously at OMA/AMO in New York and Herzog & de Meuron in Basel, Schricker works on a range of scales, internationally, from his New York base and his two-pronged practice – ASA North is a more 'traditional' architecture practice, while its sister studio, ASA South, operates in the virtual realm. Ongoing work in the Asia region by ASA North includes the first, new-build Virtual Museum for art collector Mohammed Afkhami in Dubai, and the masterplan of a 7,800 sq m cultural centre around Saba Manouchehri’s textile collection in the city of Kashan, Iran.

INFORMATION

pejman.foundation

asanorth.com

hobgoodarchitects.com

The idea for an exhibition of Louise Bourgeois’ work curated by Jenny Holzer had been in process for some time before the puzzle pieces came together. But the Kunstmuseum Basel began to work in earnest with Holzer and the Eastern Foundation, Bourgeois’ estate, and at long last, this potent meeting of creative minds is a reality.

In ‘The Violence of Handwriting Across a Page’ Holzer curates selected excerpts of Bourgeois’ notes and writings alongside her artwork in a huge exhibition that spans sculpture, installation, works on paper and textile art. Tying these elements together captures the essence of Bourgeois as an artist, a person deep, forceful, outspoken and uncompromising.

‘I was invited to her house, and I had the luxury of spending an extended period of time with her, where I could look at, for example, a red wax ear of what appeared to be a demon sitting on the table beside us, and to have [an] extended, unselfconscious, absolutely sincere conversation about how to make the colour blue work,’ Holzer recalled of their first meeting.

Holzer, who knew the legendary late French artist when they both lived in New York, always held great respect for her work and achievements. Combining this with an intrinsic boldness and understanding of the impact of language, Holzer brought together the text selected for the exhibition alongside works created throughout Bourgeois’ prolific career. 

‘We went deep into the writing. She worked incessantly on her art, and wrote when she couldn't sleep, so we had a treasure trove,’ said Holzer, who brought in a team of readers to get as deep an understanding as possible of the artist’s notebooks.

Holzer’s clean, precise type only serves to emphasise the visceral fury, blood, sex and humour in Bourgeois’ words and works, in projections that cover the façades of three locations in the city at night – Kunstmuseum Basel, City Hall, and the Old University on the Rheinsprung. Inside the museum, the works tap into Bourgeois’ comfort with extreme thoughts and emotions. Her drawings and textile works bear phrases such as ‘The Rage to Know’ and ‘I am afraid therefore I live’. You can also experience these through an augmented reality app and Instagram filter. 

‘As they say in Brooklyn, she was not playing,’ said Holzer. ‘Although she did have a wonderful sense of humour [and] a sense of adventure, she was utterly serious, dead serious about what she attempted and she would try again, again and again, to get it right. Unlike many artists, she often did.’

In studying Bourgeois’ notes – a task Holzer says she could never have done while Bourgeois was alive – she was able to see where words and ideas translated into sculpture and drawing. Shown in Europe for the first time is the mechanised work Twosome, 1991, which links the old museum, the Hauptbau, to the contemporary wing, the Neubau via an underground passage. This takes you to four works by Bourgeois, in dialogue with the medieval to post-impressionist collection including pieces by Holbein and Cézanne. 

Holzer’s take on Borgouis is a celebration of this inimitable artist. From an air of levity as you hear her singing in the museum lifts and bathrooms to her unwavering fearlessness and ability to confront the most unruly facets of humanity, this work hits you with its complexity in a manner impossible to misinterpret. ‘She was enormously intelligent,’ said Holzer. ‘She was distressed, she was determined, she had incredible range, she was obsessive, she was furious, she would have a giggle from time to time and I will have to resort to the word infinite again. She was infinite.’

INFORMATION

Louise Bourgeois x Jenny Holzer: 'The Violence of Handwriting Across a Page', until 15 May 2022, Kunstmuseum Basel. kunstmuseumbasel.ch

Looking at it peeking through the Dubai skyline, it feels clear that the Museum of the Future was not designed to be subtle; rather, it was designed to celebrate and shout about human achievement and the innovation that guides humankind into the future. Housed in a suitably eye-catching building, rounded, gleaming and adorned with Arabic calligraphic inscriptions, this new cultural destination in the UAE turns the idea of a museum on its head. Instead of being a home for historical artefacts, it is an experimental space, hailed as a hub to inspire the future of humanity. The brainchild of the Dubai Future Foundation and architect Shaun Killa of Killa Design, the project will house a permanent exhibition of human technology and creative thinking; and it opens its doors to the public today (22 February 2022). 

The building was conceived by Killa ‘as an architectural and cultural icon’, and it's true that its striking, shimmering volume is as memorable as it is dramatic. The architect composed its flowing form using computer-aided design, harnessing state-of-the-art technology in volume shaping and futuristic visions of architecture to achieve his goal. The result is an impressive 77m high, seven-storey toroidal structure built without using a single column. 

Museum of the Future

The glistening structure is clad in stainless steel panels manufactured by robots that produced the pattern that makes up its skin – lines of Arabic calligraphy representing three quotes on the future by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the UAE and ruler of Dubai. These say: ‘We may not live for hundreds of years, but the products of our creativity can leave a legacy long after we are gone’; ‘The future belongs to those who can imagine it, design it, and execute it. It isn’t something you await, but rather create'; and ‘Innovation is not an intellectual luxury. It is the secret behind the evolution and rejuvenation of nations and peoples’.

Made using technologically advanced building methods, the Museum of the Future also employs modern sustainable architecture strategies, such as solar power (the structure is powered through its own dedicated solar park). Inside, a multipurpose hall sits at the core of the building, surrounded by further spaces including a lecture hall, innovation laboratories for health, education, smart cities, energy and transportation, and permanent exhibition areas. 

‘The Museum of the Future is a “living museum”, constantly adapting and metamorphosing as its very environment drives continual and iterative change to its exhibits and attractions,’ says Mohammed Al Gergawi, UAE minister for cabinet affairs and chairman of the Dubai Future Foundation. ‘The museum brings together futurists, thinkers, innovators and the public in a testbed of ideas that define the world of the future and shape the way we interact with our world to come.’ 

INFORMATION

killadesign.com

G-Shock has collaborated with London’s Museum of Youth Culture on a limited-edition watch. The Museum of Youth Culture examines the relationship between young people and modern society through an archival examination encompassing more than 150,000 photographs and texts, an extensive body of research that informs the new G-Shock watch – the GW-M5610MOYC-1ER (available now at £149).

The new piece nods to the design codes of the original, with the rectangular case shape of the GW-M5610U-1ER a familiar feature. The classic watch design is juxtaposed against sporty new accents, such as the resin band that features work from photographer Gavin Watson, best known for his documentation of the skinhead, rave and punk scenes.

G-Shock and Museum of Youth Culture watch

‘We are super excited to collaborate with G-Shock and celebrate the amazing history of the brand, showcasing the importance of it within youth culture,’ says Jon Swinstead, founder of the Museum of Youth Culture. ‘Being able to delve into our archive and unearth a massive variety of subcultures who wore G-Shock has been fascinating. Throughout the various subcultures, from street to punk, to the emerging subcultures in the modern day, the significance of G-Shock over the last 40 years within youth culture and [for those] growing up in Britain, evidently, is immense.’

The watch doesn’t compromise on functionality, with an emphasis on a slick technicality seen in the radio-controlled technology that ensures ultimate accuracy. Solar power increases reliability, while a stopwatch, timer and world time mode are handy extras.

‘This collaboration with the Museum of Youth Culture boasts attitude that is of a certain time,’ states Casio, the watchmaker behind G-Shock. ‘It is instantly identifiable and celebrates a shared experience of growing up in Britain and never giving up.’

The new release is currently being marked with an exhibition at the museum, on London’s Shaftesbury Avenue, until 4 March 2022, which explores the history of G-Shock since its inception in 1983, with a look at rare models and memorabilia.

INFORMATION

g-shock.co.uk

Located in south-east China, about an hour’s drive from Shanghai, Hangzhou has historically been an important hub for artists and scholars. In recent times, it has earned an enviable reputation for cultivating and exporting art and culture. Hangzhou cemented its artistic credentials with the opening last December – after nine years of preparation – of By Art Matters, the cultural centre and main architectural feature of the city’s OōEli multi-use complex.  

By Art Matters’ inaugural exhibition, ‘A Show About Nothing’, explores the concept of ‘nothingness’. Bringing together more than 30 local and international artists – including Francis Alÿs from Belgium, Maurizio Cattelan from Italy, Hiroshi Sugimoto and Yoko Ono from Japan, and Cady Noland and Robert Grosvenor from the US – the show was proposed by the museum’s director Francesco Bonami, and curated by Stefano Collicelli Cagol together with Wu Tian and Sun Man.

One interpretation of the subject is German artist Hans Haacke’s White Sail (1964 – 1965). White fabric floating in mid-air is loosely mounted on the wall by thin threads and weights. Its form is determined both by artificial wind and visitors’ movements, making visible the otherwise unnoticeable interplay between the space, the people and the artworks within it. Museum visitors are all too often overloaded with images and information at the expense of the artistic experience. And while conventional exhibitions tell the stories of others, ‘A Show About Nothing’ ‘invites you to tell your own story’, says Bonami. ‘The exhibition is a toast to empty spaces, the nothingness in our everyday lives.’ 

Visitors can seek their own interpretation of nothingness through a selection of seminal Chinese artworks on display including those by Zhengzhou artist Geng Jianyi, who had been an active voice in the 85 New Wave art movement and was an accomplished painter before venturing into performance, photography, installation and video. In the series The Reason Why Classic Is, Immerse and Ten Seconds Immersion (12) (both 1999), empty books of different textures and binding methods have been soaked in dye for varying lengths of time. As the colours bleed towards the centre of the books, they form a symmetrical pattern yet with subtle differences each time. Books are a representation of wisdom and authority, and through these works Geng aimed to denounce how ideologies infiltrate societies through cultural media. 

Shandong artist Liu Guoqiang’s Untitled (2021) consists of nine small digital screens, each showing a dissected minute hand of a clock in a one-minute video loop that plays asynchronously. A complete image of the clock will never be formed, yet it still depicts the notion of time as an undeniably dominant force in reality, no matter how we try to distort it. Bread (2020), by Swedish artist Ghislaine Leung, releases a bread-like aroma through an under-floor ventilation system. The presence of the sensory installation signifies that experience and engagement are both essential in a cultural institution. 

Situated between the picturesque West Lake (a Unesco World Heritage Site) and Xixi Wetland, OōEli – designed by architect Renzo Piano – has a notched trapezoidal layout, about 260m x 175m, composed of 17 buildings with public space and greenery. By Art Matters resides in building number one, which is designed as the starting point for visitors to the complex. It is Piano’s first museum building in China, envisaged as a hub of the international and domestic art scene and a centre for research and artistic practice, where nature, art, architecture and culture intersect. The nine-storey structure has a total exhibition area of about 2,000 sq m, with a lecture hall, library, office spaces, a meditation tea house created by Thai artist Rirkrit Tiravanija and a harvestable tea tree garden on the roof – a tribute to Hangzhou as the hometown of Longjing tea.  

The museum team also commissioned British artist Richard Long to create a site-specific installation, Boulder Line, in the complex, and initiated a collaboration between Theaster Gates and the B1OCK concept store, where the American artist proposed ideas for the interior space, including antique objects and an installation of eight mixed-media artworks – a minimalist hybrid of exhibition and retail.

INFORMATION

‘A Show About Nothing’, until 8 May 2022, By Art Matters

British designer Mac Collins is the winner of the Design Museum’s inaugural Ralph Saltzman Prize, an annual award for emerging designers. As part of the prize, Collins will be awarded a £5,000 bursary, and will show his work at a solo exhibition at the Design Museum, from 2 February until 2 April 2022. 

The Design Museum’s Ralph Saltzman Prize

‘I created The Ralph Saltzman Prize as a legacy to my father,’ says Lisa Saltzman. Ralph Saltzman was the co-founder and chairman of Designtex, and through his company, he championed many innovations in design and sustainability. ‘The Prize will be a way to give young designers an opportunity, an honorarium and a show,' she continues. 'Mac is a worthy winner. In addition to the aesthetic quality, Mac brings personal narratives into his work and considers his practice as an exploration of his identity within the African Diaspora, and that is interesting.’

The work of Mac Collins

Collins was nominated by designers Kim Colin and Sam Hecht of Industrial Facility, and was chosen by a jury chaired by Justin McGuirk, chief curator at the Design Museum. Collins’ work was selected for the personal approach to his designs, and for his ability, McGuirk notes, to ‘break away from paradigms and introduce clean decisions: there is something quite strong in his processes as a designer’.

Collins graduated from Northumbria University, Newcastle, in 2018. Through his work, he explores personal and cultural narratives, in particular his own identity and Caribbean heritage.

Collins’ graduate project, the ‘Iklwa’ chair, was acquired by Benchmark and produced by the British brand as a collection that includes two chairs and a table. Collins was also part of Discovered, an initiative from Wallpaper* and AHEC, supporting the work of emerging designers through mentorship, the manufacturing of their design, and an exhibition at the Design Museum. In September 2021, Collins was awarded the Emerging Design Medal during London Design Festival.

‘It is an honour to receive the inaugural Ralph Saltzman Prize at the Design Museum,’ says Collins. ‘The bursary provides a degree of financial, and thus creative, freedom to communicate a current narrative through a new collection of works. This accolade also provides a physical platform to present work within an institution that carries considerable weight.’

INFORMATION

designmuseum.org
maccollins.com

Few places rival the intensity of Doha. Even in late November, your face is cocooned in heat; the horizon wobbles, sizzles and steams. Somewhere between England and Qatar, the colours have turned from green to gold. Doha emerges like a gilded, water-encircled canvas, primed for anyone with a creative vision as vast as its landscape. 

I’m with a small group of journalists at the invitation of Qatar Museums. We’re here to witness the fruits of the country's cultural transformation; one born with the discovery of oil in the mid-20th century, and that has since evolved into a contemporary Renaissance that has the attention of the world. 

Day 1 in Doha: Jeff Koons, lunch at the Culture Pass Club, Christian Dior

At Qatar Museums’ Gallery Al Riwaq, we find Jeff Koons: ‘Lost in America’. This is the artist’s first show in the Gulf, and its significance is not lost on Qatar.

Curated by Massimiliano Gioni, the show is presented as part of the Qatar-United States 2021 Year of Culture. Koons has conceived it as an expanded self-portrait of sorts. We’re greeted by a photograph of him aged five, earnest, doe-eyed, and with that unmistakable, ready-made beam that’s followed him throughout his career. He wears the same expression at the press conference, where he quotes The Beatles’ ‘I am the Walrus’: ‘I am he as you are he as you are me’, and reasserts his well-trodden principles: transcendence, transformation and self-acceptance.

These days, the locations of Koons’ exhibitions feel just as significant as their contents. As a concession to regional norms, the show is devoid of the raunchier facets of his work, yet it doesn’t feel deprived. 

The sheer enormity of the museum means the pieces are socially distanced. Until now, I had never quite appreciated the extent of Koons’ calculating precision, his ability to optically toy with the viewer and suspend disbelief. He metamorphoses materials: bronze resembles vinyl, plaster looks like a cotton-covered inflatable, and, in his newest works, marble is dressed down as though an oversized ceramic trinket. These replicas of replicas reflect just how easily we fall for artifices; rather than critiquing consumerism, they celebrate it. 

At lunchtime, we head to Qatar’s first members-only arts club, Culture Pass Club. Think Soho House, but if every house consisted of multiple houses encircling an idyllic courtyard and had interiors by the likes of India Mahdavi, Rossana Orlandi and leading local designers including Aisha Al-Sowaidi and Wadha Al Hajri. 

Next on the itinerary is M7, Qatar’s 312,000 sq ft hub for fashion and design innovation. Earlier in November, the fashion world elite gathered at the art centre for the Fashion Trust Arabia prize, recognising emerging talent in the Middle East and North Africa region. 

Following a momentary distraction from a thorny Isa Genzken sculpture in M7’s atrium, we shift our focus to ‘Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams’. It’s a reinvention of a resoundingly successful exhibition that previously showed in Paris, London, Shanghai and New York, and features pieces from the private collection of Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, mother of the Emir and long-time Dior client. 

In the evening, we head back to Gallery Al Riwaq for the ‘Lost in America’ reception. It’s disorientating and refreshing to mingle at an art world vernissage unaccompanied by flutes of champagne (In deference to Sharia law, the Qatari government places strict restrictions on the availability of alcohol). But what it lacks in booze, Qatar makes up for in juice, offered liberally, and in most shades of the rainbow. Armed with hyper-real sobriety and tripping on a sugar high, we’re all ready to focus on the art. 

It’s dinnertime, and presumably owing to good behaviour, we’ve been invited by Her Excellency Sheikha Al Mayassa Bint Hamad Al-Thani, chairperson of Qatar Museums (and cultural arbiter of the nation) to attend the official dinner for Koons. I’m sartorially ill-prepared for the occasion, but manage to dress up my practical desert-wear to a passable standard. 

We’re ushered to a palatial first-floor courtyard at the IM Pei-designed Museum of Islamic Art – which is officially closed for renovation. The architect, who was 91 when he was coaxed out of retirement for the project, was given free rein to choose any spot in Doha for the museum, and he insisted that future buildings could not encroach on its space. The solution? Qatar gave the building its own island. 

There’s more multicoloured juice on silver platters, and American-themed food on the menu. There’s also a photo booth for the star-studded guest list. (Photo booth is an understatement, I mean a self-contained studio where Brigitte Lacombe, portraitist to superstars, is taking the photographs).

After dinner, we’re taken to the underground conservation laboratory. An expert restorer shows us to his workstation, where the magic is happening. We swarm like insatiable magpies around a falcon from 17th-century India: solid gold and laden in rubies, emeralds, diamonds and sapphires. It’s impossibly beautiful, priceless beyond comprehension, and shimmers to the point of hypnosis. Suddenly, this begins to feel rather familiar – Jeff Koons would be all over this! Right on cue, he arrives at the lab for a closer look. 

Day 2: Sport, Virgil Abloh, a history of Qatar

I have a hangover. Not the post-alcohol kind, but a juice-induced sugar comedown of epic proportions. But enough whining, it’s time for sport. 

Today is the first day of the inaugural Qatar Grand Prix Formula One and sport is on the agenda. Around Doha, construction is in abundance as Qatar spruces up to host the 2022 World Cup, which will kick off in precisely one year. It’s a palpably exciting crescendo, but has not been without controversy. Qatar’s treatment of migrant workers responsible for World Cup-related infrastructure has been under intense scrutiny. The Qatari government disputed a 16 November 2021 report by Amnesty International claiming that labour reforms have not translated into changes on the ground, but also stated that ‘Qatar has never shied away from acknowledging that its labour system is still a work in progress.’ 

We are treated to a preview tour of the soon-to-open 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, sited adjacent to the Khalifa International Stadium. As an arts journalist, I’m a little out of my depth, but nonetheless an eager student. The museum aims to educate and entertain, offering a history of Qatari sport while providing family-focused interactive games to encourage physical activity. 

Next, we head to the W Hotel for another dose of Jeff Koons. This time, he’s in conversation with Sheikha Al Mayassa as part of the Art for Tomorrow Talks, in association with The New York Times. Just as I reflect on how, in the last three months, I have spent more time in the physical presence of Koons than I have my own mother, it’s time for art by Virgil Abloh. 

Like Koons’, this is Abloh’s first museum exhibition in the Middle East. Held at Fire Station, an arts hub and artist residency centre, ‘Figures of Speech’ offers a deep dive into Abloh's pioneering media practice spanning visual arts, music, fashion, architecture and design. (Since our visit, the show – a mid-career retrospective  – has taken on a new poignancy. On Sunday 28 November, in a moment that shook the world, the celebrated artist Virgil Abloh passed away from a rare cancer, aged 41.)  

The next stop is the Jean Nouvel-designed National Museum of Qatar, which blooms from the landscape like a desert rose. This extraordinary building comprises flying saucer-like discs of varying diameters, which engulf the restored palace of Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim Al Thani, son of the founder of modern Qatar.

The galleries tell us about the history of Qatar, without following the conventional museum formula. Here, everything from the natural history of the Persian Gulf to the establishment of the Qatari state, and to the discovery of oil is narrated via innovative audiovisual elements, seamlessly integrated into Nouvel’s design. The museum celebrates the heritage of Qatar, but also puts a spotlight on its rapid modernisation, growth and extraordinary cultural change. 

We head back to the hotel on Doha’s gleaming new UNStudio-designed metro. Completed in 2019, the network is divided into three travel sections: Standard, Family (for solo women and anyone commuting with children) and Gold (for Goldclub Travel Card holders). Boasting rapid speeds, onboard Wi-Fi and USB charging for Goldclub members, this is surely the envy of the subterranean world, and makes most of the London Underground look and smell like Dante’s Inferno. 

Day 3: Kader Attia, a palace of books, and the desert sun set on Richard Serra

We arrive at Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art. Following a momentary malfunction of the Ehteraz app (Qatar’s mandatory Covid-19 contact-tracing service), I’m soon in the clutches of ‘Kader Attia: On Silence’, a show of staggering scale, depth and intensity. Attia turns his focus to the complex histories of the Middle East and North Africa, and Doha itself, a multicultural global city of migration and constant social and political evolution.

At the centre of the show is the title work, On Silence. One of two new commissions for the exhibition, it comprises a room filled with prostheses suspended from the ceiling. Though unsettling in their number, they are presented as objects of restoration and optimism for those who have lost limbs in conflict. Attia uses silence as a vehicle for communication: silence to cut through the noise of human suffering (colonialism, political oppression and environmental devastation), enforced silence as a catalyst for trauma, voluntary silence as a conduit to reckoning and repair. 

In the 1970s, Doha was but a few modest buildings surrounded by desert. Its statement piece was the spaceship-esque Sheraton Hotel, a striking example of modernism by architect William L Pereira (who also designed San Francisco’s Transamerica Pyramid) that perfectly straddles utopia and dystopia. These days, the skyline is a tapestry of architectural delights, particularly in the Education City.

We’re here to visit the Rem Koolhaas-designed Qatar National Library, a vast, tiered, glass-clad palace of books and artefacts fit for the digital age. This high-tech sanctuary for research also functions as a custodian of Qatar’s heritage by preserving and making accessible the country’s recorded history. 

As the sun sets on our tour of Doha, there is one final stop, the middle of the desert. Our Jurassic Park-style off-roaders jiggle over the undulating dunes through the Brouq Nature Reserve. After 20 minutes of dizzying motion, we reach our destination: a natural corridor formed by gypsum plateaus, home to one of the most triumphant examples of public art: Richard Serra’s East-West/West-East (2014). The installation comprises four vertiginous slabs of Corten steel, each 14m high, with rusted-matte surfaces absorbing the ethereal orange sun.

Spanning more than a kilometre, East-West/West-East slices up the sky like an oversized game of dominoes being played by some higher, much larger power. If an epiphany could occur anywhere, it’s surely here.

INFORMATION
qm.org.qa

Narbo Via, a museum of Roman antiquities designed by Foster + Partners, is about to launch in Narbonne. Opening in an official ceremony tomorrow (11 December 2021), the brand new cultural draw for the region is set to become a landmark destination for its city, located on the Canal de la Robine in southern France. 

The museum’s low, linear volume is raised on a podium, balancing ‘civic monumentality’, the architects say, with restraint. It is placed among lush, green architectural gardens and landscaping including an outdoor theatre, embedding the new structure into its surroundings. Stone mixes with steel and a distinctive concrete roof, making for a building that appears strong and firmly linked to the earth and its site. 

And while the exterior is defined by its relatively discreet, yet confident, presence, the interior clearly and unashamedly celebrates its content by placing it centre stage through the presence of a ‘Lapidary Wall’, a shelving grid featuring stone displays that belong to the collection. This architectural element is open for all to see, cleverly separating public galleries and restoration spaces where specialists are at work to preserve the museum’s precious cargo. Visitors can catch glimpses of the professionals at work through this semi-permeable wall that places the collection at the design’s heart.

The project also includes an array of public-facing spaces, such as galleries for permanent and temporary exhibitions, a multimedia education centre, an auditorium, a restaurant and a bookshop. Research, restoration and storage facilities, as well as offices, complete the building, which is brightly lit through swathes of glass in openings and floor-to-ceiling transparent walls. 

Foster + Partners has recently completed more work in France – namely the winery Le Dôme, which opened its doors to visitors a couple of months ago. It sits alongside older, iconic projects from the firm’s portfolio, such as the Millau Viaduct and the Carré d’Art in Nîmes. ‘Our work on Narbo Via extends a long relationship between the Foster studio and the south of France. The arts are vital to the life of a city, and a cultural building has the potential to reinvent and regenerate its “sense of place”, to break down physical and social barriers. Bringing together the old and the new, Narbo Via will renew the image of the museum, becoming not just a place for reflection but a creator of knowledge for future generations,’ says the practice’s renowned founder and executive chairman, Norman Foster. 

Looking to the future, the Narbo Via building also employs a comprehensive sustainability strategy. This, the architects note, has been inspired by ancient Roman technology. Natural ventilation is achieved through the clever concrete ceiling structure that helps push air to circulate throughout the interior, supporting a healthy environment for visitors, as well as its rich collection of Roman antiquities. 

INFORMATION

fosterandpartners.com

The Design Museum has marked its fifth anniversary with a virtual experience which brings extreme climate change to London. The Landmarker project, in partnership with Snap, invites visitors to view the building through a Snapchat filter which imagines an apocalyptic alternative reality.

Architect Mariam Issoufou Kamara worked with Snap’s AR technology to bring the project to life. ‘For an architect whose practice is in a desert country like Niger, the effects of the climate crisis are already all around us through increased droughts, floods, and even climate refugees,’ she says. ‘This collaboration with the Design Museum and Snap, really allowed me to explore a future where the climate has changed drastically, a new normal if you will. I wanted to use the facade of the Design Museum to explore how the built environment might respond to harsh conditions, and how we could perhaps put buildings to use in order to serve new needs under extreme conditions.’

In line with the transformation of the environment depicted in the filter, the building’s materials will also transform, for an optimistic look at how buildings can adapt to the demands of their environments. For chief curator of the Design Museum, Justin McGuirk, the filter is a chance to explore how existing structures can be a part of the climate change response. ‘The imaginative re-use of existing structures needs to be at the heart of a climate-conscious architecture,’ he says. ‘And since augmented reality is such an engaging way of reimagining buildings, we are delighted to be partnering with Snap and Mariam Kamara to explore how our own home might be adapted in the future. What better way to celebrate the Design Museum’s birthday, and the revival of a much-loved building, than to keep visualising alternative futures for it.’

INFORMATION

designmuseum.org
snap.com

The Garage Museum of Contemporary Art has announced that Japanese architecture firm SANAA will oversee the renovation of the Hexagon pavilion, converting the disused Moscow landmark into a major new exhibition hub. The Garage Museum extension heralds a new chapter for the museum in its ongoing efforts to repurpose architectural heritage in the city and revitalise it in a contemporary context.

The Hexagon – a listed 1920s Soviet structure designed by Russian architect Ivan Zholtovsky – has lived many lives. Originally constructed for 1923’s First All-Russian Agricultural and Handicraft Industries Exhibition, the pavilion was converted into a canteen in 1935 and repurposed for lemonade production in the 1960s. In the decades that followed, it served as a café, a restaurant, a beer garden, a cinema and a disco, until it was abandoned. The Hexagon today stands partially ruined following a series of fires.

In its newest incarnation as an exhibition centre, the Hexagon will encompass three galleries, a library, a bookstore, a café and a courtyard spanning some 9,500 sq m of functional space. ‘In keeping with the spirit of Zholtovsky’s original design, we tried to avoid partitions or different types of organisations within the space and tried to bring it back to his vision,’ explained the architects. ‘We were fascinated by the original transparency of the space. The Hexagon has a particular charm and we have tried to retain that in our design.’

To wit, SANNA’s concept is guided by six principles: geometry and proportion; connected spaces; daylight; spatial organisation; decorative and interior elements; and landscape. Moscow’s dramatic climate poses its own set of challenges too, which architects Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa have addressed with advanced envelope and heat recovery systems, and high-performance glazing. 

Garage Museum extension set to transform the Hexagon

The Garage Museum was established in 2008 by Dasha Zhukova and Roman Abramovich as the first philanthropic organisation in Russia devoted to contemporary art and culture. In 2015, the museum relocated to its permanent home in the former Vremena Goda restaurant, a Soviet-era modernist ruin resurrected by Rem Koolhaas’ firm OMA. Garage has collaborated with a number of architectural studios, including Shigeru Ban, Form Bureau, Snkh, Syndicate, and Grace.

‘The Hexagon will be revived by SANAA’s thoughtful and sensitive design, allowing Garage to ground itself in Russian history while expanding into the current global conversation,’ Zhukova says in a statement. ‘We want to ensure that our building reflects our ongoing inquiry into the function, purpose, and responsibility of the modern-day museum.’ 

INFORMATION

sanaa.co.jp

garagemca.org

Norwegian furniture company Vestre and designers Andreas Engesvik and Jonas Stokke have created furniture for the Munchmuseet, or Munch Museum, in Oslo, opened in October 2021 and designed by Spanish architecture firm Estudio Herreros. Dubbed ‘The Munch Series’, the Munch Museum furniture collection comprises chairs and tables used for the café, as well as sofas, benches, and lounge chairs used throughout the space.

Seating at the Munch Museum

‘Even if it is a museum, things do not have to be uncomfortable,’ says Stokke. ‘You can quickly draw some narrow flat wooden benches with thin leather cushions. But we wanted visitors to be able to take a break and really rest. And then you are going to need ergonomics in the back and a shaped seat.’ 

Designed in collaboration with Engesvik (the two designers, as well as Vestre, won a public competition to design the series in 2017), the furniture pieces feature layers of steel mesh arranged over steel frames and moulded cushions made of wool textile. The materials were chosen to complement the design: the frame’s weight helps maintain stability, the steel mesh was chosen for maximum ergonomics, and the cushions offer a tactile feel to achieve comfort and warmth. 

‘The museum is also built so that you can move upwards, directly to a special department, without going through all the halls,’ continues Stokke. ‘We wanted to make room for a break exactly where the visitors come out of one department and are on their way to move on to the next one.’

The colour palette was another important element to consider; the designers analysed hundreds of Munch’s paintings and worked closely with Norwegian paint maker Jotun to create bespoke shades for the furniture. The resulting three colours, dusty pink, ochre yellow and dark blue, are dubbed ‘Skin’, ‘Hair’, and ‘Night’, and reflect the design duo’s personal interpretations of the art on display.

Like all Vestre products, the Munch Museum furniture is made to last: all elements have been welded together, galvanized, and varnished, making the pieces extremely durable and suitable as both indoor and outdoor furniture. Each piece was made so that even if its colour fades after a few decades, it will be easy to sandblast it and repaint it. ‘The museum will attract people from all over the world: it is a perfect arena to promote what we call everyday democracy, meeting places where people can come together and share thoughts, life experiences, and exchange ideas,’ says Thomas Sund, Vestre's vice CEO.

‘When something is really good and of high quality, it becomes universal,’ adds Engesvik. ‘The design is very basic, it has no secrets. If people understand what they see, they feel safe.

INFORMATIONADDRESS

vestre.com

ADDRESS

Munch Museum
Edvard Munchs Plass 1
0194 Oslo
Norwa

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J.Hannah, a brand best known for its modern interpretations of heirloom jewellery and jazzy nail polish shades, has just launched a line of polishes in collaboration with The Metropolitan Museum of Art inspired by the museum’s new exhibition, ‘Surrealism Beyond Borders’. 

The new collection comes a year after J.Hannah’s first collaboration with The Met, on a range of black, pearl, and glittery metallic shades inspired by the Costume Institute’s ‘About Time’ exhibition. The Met Surrealist Polish Set features a more vibrant range of colours, which J.Hannah’s founder, Jess Hannah Révész, describes as ‘twists on vivid shades that were at once familiar and slightly strange, like a dream you can’t quite remember’. 

Explaining the thought process behind each of the three shades, Révész notes that Carnelian, a faded tomato red, ‘is a reference to the symbolic role that red plays in the Surrealist movement, an iconic statement in the form of pigment’. Prim, a soft powdery blue, is ‘an ode to unmoored sky [and] a nod to the familial nickname of Surrealist artist Leonora Carrington’.

Meanwhile, Enigma, a yellow-toned artichoke green, ‘hints at Surrealism’s deep strangeness, an embrace of the unsettling, uneasy delve into the subconscious’. 

Even before The Met collaborations, J.Hannah has looked to art to inspire its singular nail polish shades. Some of its most memorable colours include Hepworth, a taupe shade inspired by the British sculptor’s muted palette; and Agnes, a delicate pink drawn from the Minimalist works of Agnes Martin. 

‘We’re guided by colour as idea,’ says Révész, ‘chasing the possibility of what a feeling or concept might look like in visual form, rather than holding an allegiance to pure optics or trend. As a result, we’ve been delighted to find an expansive beauty in overlooked or untraditional shades or, in some cases, colours that are considered outright “ugly” or boring.’

INFORMATION

metmuseum.org

jhannahjewelry.com

American artist Saul Steinberg (1914 – 1999) loved Milan. He lived in the city between 1933 and 1941 while studying architecture at the Politecnico and creating satirical vignettes for local newspapers, and he dedicated many of his works to Milan. A new exhibition at Triennale Design Museum, produced in collaboration with publishing house Electa and curated by Italo Lupi and Marco Belpoliti alongside Francesca Pellicciari, explores the artist’s connections with the city while celebrating his genius. 

‘Saul Steinberg Milano New York’ at Triennale Design Museum

‘We are incredibly happy that Steinberg has returned home,’ says Triennale Museum director, Marco Sammicheli, who worked alongside the curatorial team to create the exhibition. ‘Milan was his home, and it’s here that he started building his visual world.’

The exhibition comprises 350 works that include pencil, pen and pastel drawings, works created with rubber stamps and watercolours, paper masks that explore identity and reflect on the human body, sculptures and collages – a series of techniques and styles that exemplify Steinberg’s multifaceted oeuvre. ‘Steinberg is stratified and complex, but in his complexity he uses the most simple thing: drawing,’ adds Belpoliti.

The Milan museum worked closely with institutions including the Saul Steinberg Foundation, New York’s Jewish Museum, as well as the artist’s friends and collectors of the his work, both in Italy and abroad. The exhibition also previews the donation to the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense from the Saul Steinberg Foundation.

Steinberg’s view of cities (be it Milan, Venice or imaginary cityscapes of his illustrations) is a starting point for the exhibition, and among the most important works on view is a piece he created specifically for Milan. Four preparatory drawings, each up to 10m long and concertina-folded, were photographically enlarged and applied to a curved wall created by BBPR architects for the tenth Triennale, in 1954. In this work, the curators explain, Steinberg’s affinity for the line as a narrative device begins to take shape, something that will later become one of the artist’s most distinctive motifs. 

Behind the scenes at the museum

Triennale Design Museum has documented the exhibition’s set-up, designed by Italo Lupi, Ico Migliore and Mara Servetto, for the curved gallery space that is part of its Palazzo dell’Arte. 

Here, we take a peek behind the scenes at the museum, as the exhibition was being installed. 

INFORMATION
‘Saul Steinberg: Milano New York’ is at Triennale Design Museum until 13 March 2022

triennale.org

ADDRESS

Triennale Milano
Viale Alemagna 6
20121
Milan

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Installation view of ‘10 Years Muller Van Severen’, celebrating the studio's decade in design, until 6 March 2022 at Design Museum Ghent. The exhibition features work from the studio's history as well as a curated selection from the museum displays and archives. Piece pictured above include a rug by Muller Van Severen for Ashtari, a table by Jean Prouvé, and a black chair by Maarten Van Severen

Fien Muller and Hannes Van Severen started their collaboration in 2011, coming from backgrounds in photography and sculpture respectively. In this time, they have crafted a visual style based on the juxtaposition of colour and material, a unique language that has placed them among the strongest figures in the contemporary design panorama. A new exhibition at Design Museum Ghent in the pair’s hometown (until 6 March 2022), titled ‘10 Years Muller Van Severen’ celebrates the past decade of creative collaboration, and invites the designers to share their vision through a curated display of pieces from the museum’s archives. 

Muller Van Severen: ten years of design

Muller Van Severen made its design debut at Antwerp’s Valerie Traan Gallery in 2011. The collection on display, simply titled ‘A Furniture Project’, featured pieces that combined what have since become known as some of the studio’s signature elements. The furniture was designed as mini-landscapes featuring tables, lighting and shelves in bold colours and essential shapes. ‘When the gallery asked us to collaborate we were in the throes of renovating our house and were in need of several things, including a light above our dining table,’ recall the designers. ‘One of our first solutions was to design a table with the table-leg extending and merging into a cantilever lamp. From this first design, a whole family of functional objects emerged. We are still very happy and thankful with this beneficial turn of events.’ 

The visual language of this furniture debut was further developed through several exhibitions, with the addition of seating and interlocking furniture functions into each piece, combining rigorous steel frames with the curved leather or textile seats and colourful surfaces of tables and shelves. The duo’s unique colour sensibility was developed over a series of palettes that have since become a signature chromatic touch for Muller Van Severen, making their work instantly recognisable. A defining moment for the studio was the meeting with Clémence and Didier Krzentowski of Galerie Kreo, in 2013. ‘They saw our work and immediately wanted to work with us: we discovered that we were appreciated at a high level,’ they say. 

Over the past decade, Muller Van Severen has added its unique approach to colour, shape and material to traditional household objects such as cutlery, salt and pepper shakers, rugs, mirrors, cutting boards and shelves; the duo also designed a kitchen for Reform (winner of Best Domestic Design at the Wallpaper* Design Awards 2020) as well as furniture and objects for Hay and a sofa for Kassl Editions. 

Muller Van Severen at Design Museum Ghent

Within the setting of Design Museum Ghent’s historic Hotel de Coninck, the designers present key pieces from their studio’s history, and photographs and sculptures created before 2011. Designs on display range from the wire furniture originally created for Office KGDVS’ Solo Houses development to the ‘Alltubes’ collection, whose design is defined by a repetition of aluminium tubes creating a motif adapted for different forms of seating and cabinets. 

These designs are placed in conversation with the museum’s collections, with a hundred pieces from the archives shown alongside Muller Van Severen’s works. Presented through a large, site-specific architectural installation by the duo, made using colourful paper to define the space, the curation includes pieces by Alvar Aalto, Ron Arad, Marc Newson, Studio Alchimia, Marcel Breuer and more. Each piece in the exhibition was specially selected by the designers with a ‘kindred spirit approach’, and the connections between the modern designs and their creative attitude are evident throughout. 

Among the pieces on display, the designers explain, they feel particularly close to Huub Hoste’s designs. The Belgian architect’s work was influenced by Dutch modernism and De Stijl, and the pieces in the exhibition include a cabinet created in 1926 for the Geerardyn residence in Bruges, consisting in a composition of yellow and green geometries. ‘The cupboard is a very inspiring work,’ say the designers. ‘The handling in form and colour and the direct appearance of it is related to our work.’

The exhibition is accompanied by a book titled Muller Van Severen: Dialogue, published by Walther König and exploring the studio’s creative DNA through contributions by Jan Boelen, Beatrice Galilee, Arno Brandlhuber and Sam Chermayeff. 

‘After a ten-year interval, we are staging our first major exhibition in our home city of Ghent: we are bringing our work back home,’ say the designers. ‘[It’s] a great way to make it more tangible here.’

INFORMATION

‘10 Years Muller Van Severen’ is on view until 6 March 2022
designmuseumgent.be
mullervanseveren.be

ADDRESS

Jan Breydelstraat 5
9000 Gent
Belgium

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If you've come across the city of Duisburg (population about half a million, nestled among the hills and valleys of Rhineland), chances are it would have been for its industrial architecture heritage, or status as the world's biggest inland port – or for its famed arts hub, the MKM Museum Küppersmühle, the centre for modern and contemporary art in Duisburg’s Inner Harbour and one of the most extensive private collections of German post-war art. And now, Swiss duo Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, the museum's original architects, are back in town, celebrating the launch of their latest addition to Duisburg’s culture scene, Herzog & de Meuron’s new extension of the Küppersmühle.

A look back in MKM Museum Küppersmühle’s history

If you look at the majestic, brick structure housing the museum and get visions of the Tate Modern in London, there’s good reason. Duisburg’s Küppersmühle is also the result of the Swiss architecture studio’s skillful redesign of an existing industrial building – done around the same time too (the Tate launched in 2000 and the Duisburg project in 1999). The original structure on site was a grain mill, built in 1860 by leading local industrialist Wilhelm Vedder. This was replaced in 1908 by the complex of three buildings that makes up the museum today. Over the years a boiler house, a series of adjacent steel silos, and other buildings were added, until the facility closed down in the 1970s.

Herzog & de Meuron was first involved with the site in 1997, transforming the original complex into an art hub, aiming to give the campus a new lease of life as part of the city’s regeneration plans for this part of town (the masterplan was the work of Foster + Partners). The studio was called back again in 2013, appointed to create an extension to the impressive complex of historical buildings, kickstarting a new era for MKM Museum Küppersmühle.

The MKM Museum Küppersmühle extension

Respectful to the existing, orthogonal brick volumes on site and the wider setting, the architects created an addition that becomes a seamless part of the historical whole. ‘The new structure thus completes the existing museum complex in a visually appropriate way and forms a suitable conclusion to the row of buildings along the dock,’ they say. ‘At first glance it might seem as though the new building had always been there.’

Divided into three parts, the new addition contains exhibition halls, as well as utilities and art-handling facilities across five floors (one is underground) and a massing arrangement led by local planning guidelines that stipulate no building within 40m of the autobahn. Bridges through the existing silos connect the old and new parts – although these industrial features will serve more than one purpose as American artist James Turrell has created two permanent site-specific installations for them, which are planned to be revealed in 2022. Materials were chosen to complement and draw on the historical fabric. 

A striking, curved staircase connects all floors in the new section, and supports circulation flow throughout. At the same time, through its terracotta tone and textured concrete materiality, it echoes, together with the wider project, the overall character of the Küppersmühle ‘as a typical industrial facility of the 19th and 20th centuries’ – an approach that helps to establish this museum not only as a functional, modern home for the arts, but also as a considered piece of contemporary architecture.

INFORMATION
herzogdemeuron.com

A new exhibition at The Noguchi Museum celebrates Isamu Noguchi’s love and reverence of Greece, an affection shared by Wallpaper* Design Awards winners Objects of Common Interest co-founders Eleni Petaloti and Leonidas Trampoukis, who run their design and architectural practice between Athens and New York. The show includes works by Objects of Common Interest, such as tubular lights, opal resin ‘rocks’, fabric Doric columns and blue steel sculptures, which have been curated and positioned in reciprocity with Noguchi’s existing works, by Dakin Hart, The Noguchi Museum’s senior curator and organiser of the exhibition.

Isamu Noguchi and Greece

In his working years, Noguchi (1904 – 1988) began regularly stopping off in Greece on his way back and forth between New York and Japan, although he first discovered Greece through mythology read to him by his mother: he once described the country as his ‘intellectual home’. At one stage, he located a Penteli marble craftsman who would carve rudimentary blocks of marble for him to work on back in New York, but his relationship to Greece went much deeper than the physicality of making. He forged friendships with the local creative scene, attending operas and dinners, and often carried a copy of Henry Miller’s Greek travelogue, The Colossus of Maroussi. Speaking to a Greek journalist in 1958, he recalled a recent trip to Delphi: ‘Did you notice how well the space ties in with the objects and the movements of people, and how perfectly, how wisely the whole thing is framed by nature?’

Objects of Common Interest’s Petaloti and Trampoukis, who are also co-founders of architectural practice LOT, have long been admirers of Noguchi. When the museum published its extensive archive online in 2019 (including the expansion, redesign and digital publication of its catalogue raisonné), making tens of thousands of photographs and documents available to all, the duo’s research intensified. 

‘Eleni and Leo have been interested in Noguchi for a long time. They live not far away; this is their neighborhood museum,’ says Hart. ‘The exhibition began in the best possible way, without any thought of an exhibition, in conversation: about Noguchi, and Greece, and nothing in particular. What has gradually drawn me in is the relaxed and meticulous way that they develop things that serve no specific or real or marketable purpose. They are exuberantly and brilliantly unerring in their un-aiming. That’s a rare quality, that is profoundly Noguchi-adjacent,’ he says, noting Petaloti and Trampoukis’ gentle, exploratory approach. ‘If your entire process is adaptation without a precise or particular end in mind, that makes it a lot easier to end up somewhere that feels right – even during a pandemic and an international shipping apocalypse.’ 

Petaloti says, ‘When it was written, the exhibition title, “Objects of Common Interest: Hard, Soft, and All Lit Up with Nowhere to Go”, expressed a hope, perhaps even an expectation, that by this fall, space for a playful sort of aimlessly redemptive abstraction would have returned to daily life. Reality has had other ideas.’

The collaboration 

Noguchi and Objects of Common Interest share a synergy: the ability to gently percolate global perspectives together. Petaloti and Trampoukis describe their approach as ‘an amalgamation of thinking and making between two diverse poles, Greece and New York, switching between the formal and the intuitive, embracing the handmade and the tactile, the experimental and the poetic’. Similiarly, with studios in New York, Japan and Italy, Noguchi’s peripatetic existence afforded him a fluidity of existence, living everywhere and nowhere. Always challenging the realm between art and design, his pioneering exploration of sculpture outside the formal gallery setting, the social impact of art, the meeting of conceptualism and formalism, continue to feel as poignant and relevant today as they did decades ago.

Digital and democratic

In conjunction with the exhibition, a rich and robust digital feature on The Noguchi Museum’s website shares much of the background material and research that shaped the evolution of the show, giving valuable and often unseen context. Titled ‘Noguchi in Greece, Greece Within Noguchi’, the feature includes intimate and personal archival material such as Noguchi’s own photographs of the Temple of Apollo taken in Dephi in 1949, and the Acropolis in Athens from 1950s, and handwritten correspondence to local acquaintances. A series of books will follow, expanding on the content of the digital feature, including more photography. §

INFORMATION

‘Objects of Common Interest: Hard, Soft, and All Lit Up with Nowhere to Go’ is on view until 13 February 2022

noguchi.org
objectsofcommoninterest.com

ADDRESS

The Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum
9-01 33rd Road (at Vernon Boulevard)
Long Island City
New York 11106

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NEW YORK DESIGN

The factory and the museum have become symbols of our age. They represent work and culture respectively, two apparently distinct fields of life. Today, though, this distinction is less clear-cut. Factories tell their stories through museums, explaining to the world how work itself produces culture and how culture affects industry. The Molteni Group is well aware of this relationship and invited Ron Gilad to rethink its museum at its HQ in Giussano, north of Milan, an exhibition space with a short but storied history.

Molteni Museum by Ron Gilad in Giussano

The original museum, designed by Jasper Morrison in a renovated factory building, was opened in 2015, bringing together 48 key Molteni Group designs. A year earlier, the company had opened the Glass Cube, a 400 sq m space designed by Gilad for temporary exhibitions. More recently, Morrison’s display was removed to make way for extra showroom space and Gilad was charged with repurposing his transparent pavilion, in the lush green of the company park, to provide a setting for the group’s permanent collection of historic furniture as well as for temporary exhibitions. 

The new museum is divided by angular walls that create a series of distinct spaces. Historic photographs and documents are presented on a system of wooden boards. What was an open courtyard at the heart of the building has been covered to create a central gallery, now with a large skylight and perfect for hanging two-dimensional pieces, whereas the spaces that make up the rest of the pavilion are much more agile and able to feature objects and large items of furniture. 

The series of right angles that make up the new layout give an idea of perspective from the outside and create movement. The perimeter of the perfectly square building is almost entirely transparent except for the solid walls that serve as the two external sides of a new enclosed courtyard positioned in one corner. What was space for electrics and services has now been opened up with internal glass walls apparently floating on the white gravel.

This part of the museum features designs by Gio Ponti, and Afra and Tobia Scarpa, and Aldo Rossi’s theatre seats designed in collaboration with Luca Meda. Another section explores the technological innovations that have resulted from collaborations with the likes of Norman Foster, Jean Nouvel, Rodolfo Dordoni and Vincent Van Duysen. 

As with any good contemporary museum, physical artefacts are given digital context. Molteni has produced documentaries and digital animations that chart the company’s history; these are screened within the new museum and available online. 

INFORMATION

moltenimuseum.com

ADDRESS

Molteni Museum
via Gioacchino Rossini 50
Giussano

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In a milestone moment for the Asian art scene, the much-anticipated M+ Museum will open its doors on Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour waterfront on 12 November 2021. Set to become a destination for local, regional, and international visitors, M+ seeks to foster exchange between Hong Kong and the global art community. 

Designed by Herzog & de Meuron in partnership with TFP Farrells and Arup, the 65,000 sq m M+ building – with terracotta tile-clad tower – is already one of Hong Kong’s most iconic architectural landmarks. 

The museum’s opening displays will see 1,500 works shown across 33 galleries and 17,000 sq m of exhibition space. Six thematic exhibitions have been curated from M+’s multidisciplinary contemporary collection, which spans conceptual art, moving image, design, architectural projects and archival objects. 

In the Main Hall Gallery, ‘Hong Kong: Here and Beyond’ traces the city’s transformation and unique visual culture from the 1960s to the present. ‘M+ Sigg Collection: From Revolution to Globalisation’ surveys the development of contemporary Chinese art from the 1970s to the 2000s. In the East Galleries, ‘Things, Spaces, Interactions’ focuses on the last 70 years of international architecture and design and ‘

Individuals, Networks, Expressions’ occupies the East Galleries and explores post-war international visual art told from an Asian perspective.

Elsewhere, ‘Antony Gormley: Asian Field’ sees an installation of tens of thousands of clay figurines. The work was created by the British sculptor in 2003 with over 300 members of a Guangdong village. Finally, in the Courtyard Galleries, ‘The Dream of the Museum’ explores M+’s distinctive vision for global conceptual art anchored in Asia. 

‘The official opening of M+ marks a major milestone in delivering the vision for the development of the West Kowloon Cultural District as a vital contribution to the future of Hong Kong, building on its reputation as one of the world’s leading arts and cultural hubs. We will make M+ a must-visit destination for local, regional, and international visitors,’ says Henry Tang Ying-yen, chairman of the board of the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority.

Beyond its core exhibition galleries, M+ will present a series of commissions and displays throughout its public spaces, including the M+ Facade, the Grand Stair, the Studio, the Roof Garden, and the Found Space. The M+ Pavilion – which served as the primary venue for M+ exhibitions while the museum was being constructed – will continue to host independent exhibitions and cultural activities in the Art Park after the M+ Museum opens.

‘I firmly believe that the future history of the art museum will be written to a significant degree in Asia,’ says Suhanya Raffel, M+ museum director. ‘Few institutions will be more pivotal to that story than M+, a brand new centre for visual culture and a world-class landmark for a great international city. M+ delivers the stories from our part of the world, told by voices participating in and influencing the global conversation.’

INFORMATION

M+ Museum will open on 12 November 2021 in Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, mplus.org.hk

In partnership with Visit Copenhagen

Amid cobblestone streets and idyllic canals, picturesque parks and enchanting architecture, a wide array of Copenhagen museums and cultural institutions offer something to suit every interest: on one end of the spectrum is the magnificent Statens Museum for Kunst (National Gallery) – spread across an Italianate Renaissance revival building and a modern extension, with 260,000 artworks including the world’s largest collection of paintings by Vilhelm Hammershøi; on the other, the ethereal Cisternerne, an underground reservoir transformed into a canvas for contemporary art installations.

Regardless of time period, scale and format, visitors can count on dazzling exhibits, enlightening curation, evocative settings and a wealth of amenities ranging from cafés and bars to one-of-a-kind bookshops.

While there is ample reason to visit year round, there is particular excitement around annual events such as Golden Days Festival, 3 Days of Design, and Copenhagen Art Week.

To help you navigate the Danish capital’s abundant cultural offerings, Wallpaper* has teamed up with the city’s official tourism organisation, Visit Copenhagen, to feature a quartet of notable residents, each listing their favourite museums and sharing insider knowledge of what makes their city an inspiring place to be.

Local creatives showing us the city

Each contributor is at the top of their discipline and has played a pivotal role in shaping Copenhagen’s creative scene.

Womenswear designer Freya Dalsjø has run her independent label for a decade, pushing the boundaries of material and form season after season and putting Nordic fashion on the international map.

Chef Frederik Bille Brahe has gone from popularising avocado toast to running two top museum eateries (Apollo Bar & Kantine at Kunsthal Charlottenborg, and Kafeteria at the National Gallery), brokering conversations among key cultural players while serving up simple, seasonal and immaculately presented food.

Designer Signe Bindslev Henriksen, one half of design duo Space Copenhagen, played a different role in cementing Copenhagen’s status as a culinary powerhouse, having created interiors for many pioneering restaurants; her portfolio also includes leading hotels (both local and abroad) and furniture collections.

Floral artist Julius Værnes Iversen parlayed a reputation for ‘odd-looking flower installations’ into his multidisciplinary design studio Tableau, which pairs a rotation of design and art shows with floral arrangements and has launched idiosyncratic vessels and furniture with an array of emerging talents and brands.

Copenhagen museums and cultural hotspots

Their recommendations are rich and varied. Lovers of art history will find an instant affinity for the Glyptotek, which shows art and artefacts from ancient civilisations (Egypt, Greece and Rome) and 19th century French and Danish sculpture and painting, and boasts a winter garden that will set the imagination alight; likewise, the nearby Thorvaldsen Museum holds the work and personal collection of legendary sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770 – 1844, the only non-Italian with work in St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican) in an ornate setting inspired by the excavations of Pompeii and Herculaneum; while The David Collection, housed in a rococo building that overlooks the fairy-tale turrets of Rosenborg Castle, includes an impressive collection of Islamic art alongside its European and Danish Early Modern offerings.

Those with more contemporary tastes will want to seek out Kunsthal Charlottenborg, a former palace turned cultural hub known for ambitious, often multidisciplinary exhibitions such as the ‘The World is in You’ (until January 2022), which juxtaposes bio-art and historical objects from the Medical Museion to explore how our bodies are connected to the universe. Den Frie, a space founded by artists for artists in the spirit of the Salon des Refusés, champions the avant garde within a handsome white wood pavilion by the painter JF Willumsen, with design elements inspired by Greek mythology.

Also not to be missed is the colossal Copenhagen Contemporary, a former welding hall in the rapidly transforming neighbourhood of Refshaløen that has played host to blockbuster installations: among them Anselm Kiefer’s lead airplane sculptures, Carsten Höller’s merry-go-rounds and local art practice Superflex’s three-seater swings. Its next exhibition, opening on 3 December 2021, is the first European survey dedicated to the Light and Space art movement, with blockbuster works by likes of James Turrell, Helen Pashgian and Robert Irwin.

Design is integral to Danish identity, so while the Designmuseum Denmark – with a particularly memorable display that traces the history of the Danish chair – is closed for renovation until 2022, it nevertheless features among our recommendations.

Additionally, we have a number of public attractions such as the historic Round Tower, the oldest functioning observatory in Europe; the leafy Bibliotekshave (Royal Library Park), a striking example of landscape design between the Royal Library and Christiansborg Palace; and the Botanical Gardens, notable for its cast-iron and glass palm house that dates back to 1874.

As you plan your next trip to Copenhagen, we invite you to click on the links below each illustrated map to discover a photo diary by each of our participating creatives, and get a taste of the pleasures that await you. 

Frederik Bille Brahe

Chef Frederik Bille Brahe whets our appetite for the city, and its food, with a very personal photo diary that touches on his daily routines, from morning coffee at his café Atelier September and his route to Apollo Bar & Kantine at Kunsthal Charlottenborg, to details of food preparation and floral artists. He also takes us along to some of his favourite dining spots, including vegetarian/vegan restaurant Morgenstedet in Christiania, and for cocktails at Maison with his wife Caroline Brasch Nielsen. Downtime sees him visit The David Collection (Davids Samling), and relaxing in King's Garden (Kongens Have) with his daughter.

Click here to view Bille Brahe’s photo diary

Freya Dalsjø

Going from Refshaløen in the east – home to the cavernous Copenhagen Contemporary and a number of stylist easteries – to the Statens Museum for Kunst in the city centre, fashion designer Freya Dalsjø’s tour of Copenhagen takes us along the waterfront and across the monumental Inderhavnsbroen (inner harbour bridge), with a dip in the refreshing waters along the way.

Click here to view Dalsjø’s photo diary

Julius Værnes Iversen

The vibrant colour palette of Thorvaldsens Museum, inspired by the excavations of Pompeii and Herculaneum, are a source of inspiration for floral artist Julius Værnes Iversen. It comes as no surprise that Iversen’s Copenhagen is characterised by its green spaces, each with a distinctive character: the encyclopaedic Botanical Gardens, with its imposing palm house; the serene Bibliotekshaven, where one can gaze at a statue of philosopher Søren Kierkegaard and admire the fish pond; and Amaliehaven, a garden adjacent to the winter residence of the royal family, with sculptures by Arnaldo Pomodoro and open to the public 24/7 – ‘modern and stringent’, it contrasts beautifully with old Copenhagen.

Click here to view Iverson’s photo diary

Signe Bindslev Henriksen

Starting at the showroom of the cabinetmakers who have collaborated with her design studio, Space Copenhagen, for decades, Signe Bindslev Henriksen’s tour of Copenhagen culminates in a visit to the underground Cisternerne, currently populated by Tomás Saraceno’s celestial artworks and navigable only by boat. Along the way, take in the historic Round Tower, the wonderful winter garden of the Glyptotek, as well as the Danish National Bank, an architectural landmark by Arne Jacobsen.

Click here to view Henriksen’s photo diary

INFORMATION

visitcopenhagen.com

Produced with the help of Danmarks Erhvervsfremmebestyrelse

Ordrupgaard Art Museum in Denmark, home to world-class Danish and French art, has expanded its wings with the opening of a new addition by Snøhetta. The international design studio has added five new subterranean exhibition spaces to the historic building following the museum's previous expansion by the late master designer Zaha Hadid in 2005. Discreetly situated near Jægersborg Dyrehave, Copenhagen, the state-owned art museum which was originally an impressive three-winged neo-classical country mansion continues to combine historic Danish architecture with contemporary design.

Mostly underground, the extension creates a holistic route through the museum that meticulously connects Hadid’s distinctive black lava concrete extension with the museum’s permanent collection and original building. Three of the new five spaces are dedicated to the museum's extensive assembly of French impressionist paintings while the remaining two zones masterfully link the existing exhibition spaces. The new expansion produces a well-informed circular movement throughout the building which creates a genuine sense of fluidity as one meanders around looking at the world-renowned art pieces.

The largest exhibition area is a bold, steel-skinned structure that playfully glistens in the tree-lined landscape. Inspired by the paintings of impressionist giants Degas, Monet, and Renoir, the extension exterior delicately captures light and its changing qualities. Characterized by its diagonal cut in the landscape, faceted edges, and polished finish, the form carefully guides visitors to the main entrance of the Ordrupgaard. This volume is complemented by the natural stone steps and lush surrounding foliage.

To contrast the metal exterior, Snøhetta created soft and organic interiors that help to provide a warm atmosphere. Inside, gypsum boards are mounted to oak walls which allow curators to easily change the colour scheme of each room. The ceilings on the other hand, are wrapped in crisp oak veneer cassettes with cleverly placed light fittings that help place the artwork on the centre stage. As you walk through the museum, you notice how natural daylight floods the building - both when you leave the exhibition spaces and when entering the original museum building. Here, light helps signify the transition from one building to the next.

For over three decades, Snøhetta has designed some of the most impressive cultural buildings across the globe. The transdisciplinary practice merges architecture, landscape, and interior design with graphic, product, and digital design. For their extension of the Ordrupgaard Art Museum, they have carefully considered the original structures, blended old and new, and created a fluid, elegant and refined addition to the historic Danish building.

INFORMATION
snohetta.com

Situated on Manchester City’s Cheetham Hill Road, the former synagogue that is now part of the Manchester Jewish Museum was once the focal point of a thriving community and local textile trading industry. Over time, the neighbourhood changed, and eight years ago, the Grade II-listed structure found itself in an ambiguous context of industrial warehouses and ramshackle merchants' buildings. It is in this setting that Citizens Design Bureau began searching for a way to ‘express the messiness and blurred boundaries of the surrounding context’, says practice director Katy Marks. The studio was appointed in 2016, and now, after almost a decade of planning and two years of closure, the new Manchester Jewish Museum is complete and opens its doors to the public.

A collaborative design process with the local community uncovered food as a point of intersection among multiple faiths. This led to a brief reimagining the museum as a public ‘living-room’ with the ability to host community meals and functions, as well as a range of live events.

For this to be successfully realised, it was important that the new extension did not reference any religious iconography that might subsequently reject or exclude certain communities. Externally, this intent is expressed through a perforated, Corten façade that pulls back to create a new entrance, inviting a diversity of visitors and countering the former synagogue building’s overtly religious appearance.

Internally, a well-lit atrium takes visitors through a programme of café, shop and community learning space; the last equipped to host free baking lessons with locals. Upstairs in the new gallery, a large table housing objects from the museum’s collection doubles as a surface for dining, symbolising the union of faith, culture and tradition: the invisible things that hold communities together.

The interior of the deconsecrated synagogue extends this theme of continuity and sharing through a careful restoration that remains faithful to its history as the oldest surviving synagogue in Manchester, while balancing this with the requirement for a fully functioning performance space. ‘It’s very much about not pleasing everyone but telling stories so that it speaks for itself and invites everyone,’ explains Marks. ‘This is a social history museum not a faith museum, and the synagogue is an artefact within that,’ she continues. New is integrated into old seamlessly; sound infrastructures are concealed within the balustrade which, along with the rest of the interior, has been reinstated to the original 19th-century colour palette.

Much like the synagogue’s outward expression, which reflects the geographical origins of Sephardi Jews in North Africa through its Moorish geometric motifs, the new extension reflects an emerging context of openness and exchange by facilitating intercultural dialogue, bridging religious and cultural differences to build on a shared, common experience.

INFORMATION

citizensdesignbureau.net

manchesterjewishmuseum.com

The new ANOHA Children’s World, at the the Jewish Museum Berlin, is a vast new children’s play space designed with adults firmly in mind too. Situated in a former wholesale flower market in the Kreuzberg district, it converts the story of Noah’s Ark into a rich and interactive playground. 

The wooden ark, designed by US-based Olson Kundig architecture and design practice, sits at an impressive 7m tall and measures 28m in diameter. It is surrounded by 150 wooden animal sculptures, setting a scene for the children to interpret as they wish.

When designing a children’s play space, says Olson Kundig design principal Alan Maskin, ‘the most important consideration is to not design for children but to design for everyone. Research supports the idea that children have their most memorable museum experiences when shared with family and friends. As a designer, my goal is to get parents to put down their cell phones and play alongside their children. ANOHA is intended to be as interesting, engaging and compelling to adults as to the very young, and to make play irresistible to all ages.’

It is a philosophy reflected in the design of the space, which intertwines play with functionality – children get around by slides, on climbing structures and workbenches. They can build their own boat and test it in a flood simulator, develop their own animals from organic materials and learn about the composting process through interactive games.

Throughout, children have full control. ‘Children, as a construct of being cared for by adults and having their parents manage all aspects of their lives, have few opportunities for control and personal choice,’ points out Maskin. ‘Here the design gives them that sense of agency and control over how and where they choose to play. Function manifested as play is embedded in the ways children have fun.

INFORMATION

jmberlin.de/en/ANOHA

The V&A unveils its new contemporary design gallery. ‘Design: 1900 – Now’ presents over 250 objects including furniture design, fashion, media and technology, with a focus on design and society charting the evolution of man-made objects from craftsmanship to the digital age.

The gallery’s display, explains Johanna Agerman Ross, ‘aims to position design as a means for understanding the way we live together, and to explore how designed things prompt us to ask questions of our past, present and future’. Agerman Ross joined the V&A in 2016 as curator of twentieth century and contemporary furniture, and has worked closely with senior curator of design and digital, Corinna Gardner, on the displays. 

After nearly two years of closure – the gallery has been in the making since autumn 2019 and was delayed by the pandemic – the space reopens to the public with more than 50 new acquisitions and a new focus on the Museum’s Rapid Response collecting project, showcasing design objects that respond to current social themes including, most recently, pandemic design and responses to episodes of racism.   

‘Design: 1900 – Now’ at the V&A

‘We thought about the pressing issues of today, and how they might be informed or reflected by the recent past,’ says Gardner. ‘We asked ourselves, “Where is design at its most current”? Society impacts on design, but design also impacts on society: how do we reflect that across the past 120-plus years?’

The curators’ approach features six major themes, roughly arranged in chronological order, including: Automation and Labour, covering the earlier part of the 20th century up to the 1930s; Housing and Living, looking at domestic innovations between 1920 and 1940; Crisis and Conflict, focusing on the period between 1935 and 1955. Across the hall, inside one of the V&A’s library spaces, is the Consumption and Identity display, exploring the period between 1955 and 1975, and Sustainability and Subversion, looking at the 1960s up to the year 2000. A further section on Data and Consumption explores the past two decades and the more technological side of design. The curators stress that these sections aren’t offering a strict chronological perspective; in fact, items from different periods are shown together within each thematic area, demonstrating the long-lasting influence of different design movements and moments in history. 

Design and contemporary history: in pictures

Each thematic display at the V&A's design galleries explores a seminal moment in the history of the 20th and 21st centuries, analysing design’s role in shaping and responding to the biggest issues of our times through objects and their wider contextual meaning.

The rise of industrial design: Automation and Labour

‘Today we might be concerned about robots taking our jobs, and that [same] worry about mechanisation and automation, but also the promise and possibility, was keenly felt at the beginning of the 20th century,’ says Gardner. Earlier objects on display show the idea of what mechanisation can offer in terms of new design aesthetics and new possibilities for making. The display spans from the Bauhaus, with examples such as Marcel Breuer’s tubular metal chair, to more recent objects such as Ikea’s ‘Lampan’ lamp, a response to the challenge to design ‘the world’s cheapest lamp’.

Designing the urban space: House and Living 

The second section on display explores, as Gardner explains, ‘the infrastructure of the city, and the lived experience of the urban environment’, from the home to the city. Highlights include the newly acquired British Road Signage system by Margaret Calvert and Jock Kinneir, as well as domestic product innovations ranging from the compact ‘Barbican Basin’, to Naoto Fukasawa’s CD player for Muji, and Konstantin Grcic’s multifunctional ‘Mayday’ lamp for Flos.

Design’s role in addressing global issues: Crisis and Conflict

From the Second World War to the modern day, this section looks at activism initiatives and design’s ongoing role in reacting and addressing global issues. ‘We look at the world as a place made up of the mass movement of people: we're currently experiencing the biggest movement of people since the Second World War, with over 270 million people, being called migrants by the UN and 70 million of them being refugees,’ explains Agerman Ross. Pieces such as the ‘Tala’ curry measure by Jasleen Kaur (a Scottish artist who grew up in a Sikh household in Glasgow), notes the curator, ‘speaks of the experience of creating your own unique culture in the place that we call home’. Sub-themes, the curators say, include facing issues of racism and designing with ingenuity when resources are scarce – an example being social enterprise Granby Workshop, created in Liverpool by Assemble. 

Design’s added value: Consumption and Identity

One of the questions that led the two curators throughout the process of creating the new gallery displays was: ‘When did design become design?’ The traditionally sexier side of design is explored in this section, with examples of Italian midcentury design, and pieces chronicling the added value a designer can bring to an object: case in point, Philippe Starck’s sculptural ‘Juicy Salif’ lemon squeezer for Alessi, and Virgil Abloh’s intervention on Ikea products. 

Design as a tool for innovation: Sustainability and Subversion

‘Here you have that desire for different worlds, socially, economically, but also environmentally,’ says Gardner. ‘The objects that we bring together here are those of repurposing, of recycling, but also where designers are railing against prevailing norms.’ Displays include Christien Meindertsma’s ‘Flax’ chair, the result of innovative design and manufacturing processes led by the designer using a new material for furniture production. But, perhaps most interestingly, there are also examples of design thinking that didn't quite work in practice, such as the ‘WOBO (World Bottle)', designed by N John Habraken in 1963 and intended to double as a brick after use. ‘This was an idea that wasn't fully realised, but that metrical measure of success is always an interesting point to think through, when looking at products and objects of this nature,’ explains Gardner, also citing Yves Behar's ‘One Laptop Per Child’ – ‘brilliantly influential in the design world, much more limited in its impact in the real world’.

21st century design: Data and Communication

More recent technological advancements in the world of design in this section include Front’s ‘Sketch’ chair, developed by the designers as a three dimensional hand sketch. The chair is shown next to Future Systems’ desk for Conde Nast’s Jonathan Newhouse, created in 1999; while it is an early example of computer design from the practice, the desk was hand-built by a boat building workshop in the UK.

Addressing the most pressing issues of today: Rapid Response Collecting

Showcased throughout the galleries are the V&A’s Rapid Response collection: launched in 2010, this series of 50 objects examines design’s role in shaping and responding to the biggest issues of our times and aims to spark a wider conversation about design. The most recent aquisition in this collection is a pair of posters by Asian-American artist Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya, created to respond to the recent wave of crimes against AAPI communities in the USA during the Covid-19 crisis. Another recent object in the collection is a snorkeling mask, adapted by an Italian doctor at the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, to be used as an emergency breathing mask and made available through a freely downloadable file.

INFORMATION

‘Design: 1900-Now’ is at the V&A, rooms 74, 74A & 76
vam.ac.uk

ADDRESS

Victoria & Albert Museum
Cromwell Rd
London SW7 2RL

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The American Museum of Natural History is marking the opening of the redesigned Allison and Roberto Mignone Halls of Gems and Minerals with a new exhibition. Beautiful Creatures, curated by jewellery historian Marion Fasel, looks at how animals have inspired jewellers, from Cartier’s panthers to Boucheron’s 19th century stag beetle brooch.

Fasel’s curation encompasses contemporary jewellery dating from the last 150 years, in line with the museum’s recent celebration of their 150 year anniversary. Her criteria for inclusion ensures an eclectic selection: ‘All the animals included had to be full-bodied and appear somewhere in the museum,’ she says. ‘There are no barnyard or domestic animals or animals dressed as people, which is a whimsical subgenre of animal jewellery.’

Fasel was also keen to include jewellery which revealed its context, looking at what the jewellery can tell us about the wider world. ‘Perhaps most important of all, every jewel had to reflect a cultural tide, historical event, gem discovery or advancement in jewellery technology. For example, the wings on the dragonfly designed by Julia Munson under the direction of Louis Comfort Tiffany in 1904 is a virtuoso display of early platinum work in jewelry. The birds made by French jewellers during the World War II occupation of Paris were symbols of hope and freedom. Fish brooches created from the Twenties through the 1950s by American jewellers reflected the popularity of the sport.’

Pieces by Bulgari and Van Cleef & Arpels join more contemporary designers such as Bina Goenka in the exhibition which marks the opening of the new space. Alongside the temporary exhibition gallery, it will also encompass a gallery of gems including the magnificent 563-carat ‘Star of India’ sapphire and new pieces such as the two of the largest amethyst geodes which are on display.

Exhibitions will explore how the conditions of our planet have enabled such a vast array of mineral species - it is fitting, therefore, that Fasel’s preoccupation with the natural world is the first at the temporary exhibition space, a fascination she shares with the jewellers. ‘The insects act as a canvas for artistic expression,’ she says. ‘Looking at a kaleidoscope of butterfly jewels, all designs within essentially the same outline, beautifully demonstrate how jewellery techniques and the style for and available supply of gemstones have evolved.’ 

INFORMATION
amnh.org

Its glistening façade reflecting gently on the Oslo seafront waters in Norway, the much-awaited Munch Museum, designed by Spanish architecture firm Estudio Herreros, has just been completed and is gearing up towards its public opening on 22 October 2021. Created to host the extensive body of work of Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, the building, set in the city’s growing Bjørvika district, cuts a distinctly contemporary figure, while adding a key cultural destination to the global art and architecture map.

Upon opening, the project will be the one of the world’s largest museums dedicated to a single artist. With over 26,700 works in its collection and 11 galleries to play with, the institution will, for the first time in its history, have ample space to display Munch’s work – including his large-scale murals (such as, The Sun, completed in 1909, which stretches nearly 8m). The exhibits will also include several versions of Munch’s iconic painting, The Scream.

Located a stone’s throw from another Oslo waterfront landmark, the Snøhetta-designed opera house, the museum stands 13 storeys tall. Clad in perforated, translucent aluminium that was selected specifically for its ability to reflect the colours and weather changes of the Oslo skies, its sharp-looking, geometric shape is mirrored elegantly on the fjord’s surface. Meanwhile, higher up, an outdoor terrace allows visitors to take in the landscape and the cityscape beyond. A restaurant is located on the 13th floor. 

The building boasts strong sustainability ceredentials, created as part of the city’s FutureBuilt programme (an ‘Oslo-wide initiative to halve greenhouse gas emissions across the city’, explain its creators). Recycled materials were used where possible, and energy-saving techniques throughout help lower the scheme’s overall carbon footprint.

Come October, the programme of events at the museum will launch with concerts, literature readings, performance and art workshops; all this on top of the permanent and temporary exhibitions within. The aim is to embed the museum in its community and the wider new cultural district of Bjørvika around it. The first show there, ‘Tracey Emin/Edvard Munch: The Loneliness of the Soul’, is set to explore Munch’s influence on Emin. 

INFORMATION

estudioherreros.com

The Carnavalet Museum has reopened its doors in the French capital after an extensive, four-year renovation, and it is a majestic celebration of the city of Paris – one achieved through a gentle touch that priotises respect and openness. The works, led by Chatillon Architectes, in association with Snøhetta and Nathalie Crinière’s Agence NC, focus on ‘magnifying the building’, explains the team. ‘[We had to] to reinvent everything, without changing anything.'

The museum is a long-term staple of Paris’ cultural scene, focusing on the city and its history, arts and transformations through the ages. First opening in 1880 and set mostly within two mansions, called Carnavalet and Le Peletier Saint-Fargeau, the institution had been affected by confusing layout additions and changes over the years, which meant that a redesign and refocus of its tour and narrative were becoming a pressing matter. 

The architectural team was appointed to work with the existing historical architecture, the displays, and some clever new interventions, in order to refresh the experience and create a home for the museum's extensive collections of furniture, objects and artwork that would be fit for the 21st century. Opening up the interior, and improving accessibility and legibility of the trajectory and displays were crucial. 

‘The Carnavalet Museum is not a monument, it is a small city, or rather an ecosystem with its stratifications, its fauna of sculpture, and its flora of painting... We tiptoe around it, without uprooting anything, without moving anything, with the delicacy of a botanist,' says architect and founder of Chatillon Architectes, François Chatillon, of the team’s challenge to respectfully rethink the museum.

Key design gestures include ‘rediscovering' the complex's original entrance at 23 rue de Sévigné; creating a flowing, fluid circulation plan; maintaining a visual connection with the outdoors, which was a particular challenge given the internal differences in levels and ceiling heights; and making way for whole new galleries on the first floor.

The three studios worked together on the exhibition design, aiming to create a blend of old and new that feels organic and respectful. ‘This intervention illustrates a contemporary approach that we stand for; as opposed to an architecture of rupture, it is one of historical continuity, and continuity of life,' concludes Chatillon.

INFORMATION
chatillonarchitectes.com

snohetta.com

Telling the story of the Olympic Games, past and present, a new Olympic Museum is about to open its doors in the beloved sporting event's birth country, Greece. Set in the heart of Athens and designed by local architecture practice KLab and Mulo Creative Lab, this important cultural space combines sports and culture in a monumental, minimalist and information-rich display. 

Working with the shell of an existing building, the design team focused on transforming the museum's interior in an immersive, informative experience, full of drama and draws for the visitor. At 9m high and some 3500 sq m, there was substantial space to play with. Working with a clean, pared down backdrop featuring sweeping shapes and tall ceilings, the designers employed colour accents and clever graphics to create a composition that feels clean, welcoming and engaging. 

The displays are organised into two parts. One tells the story of the Olympic Games, from their very foundation in ancient Greece to today’s international sporting get-together every four years. The second addresses themes around the Games’ evergreen values, the Olympic movement (also celebrated in museums in other parts of the world, such as the recent DS+R work in Colorado) and the role of athletes and individual sports. 

The architects and designers developed the architecture and exhibition design in parallel, so the whole feels coherent. Objects and spatial elements are in sync, complementing each other, but without the interior detracting from the information-rich content. Powerful geometries draw the eye but their abstraction allows different readings so that the architecture doesn’t become distracting. Light was also a crucial element in the space – it appears everywhere, bright, like the sunlight in the Greek landscape, but its sources are hidden and subtle. The design team worked with lighting specialists Coolshadow on the concept. 

‘We had infinite sources of inspiration for the overall composition,’ says KLab’s director Konstantinos Labrinopoulos, ‘as we had many objects to work with, supported by other museums and cultural bodies. Our design, to an extent, highlights the sense of sporting competition, through the depictions of athletes in motion, which in turn is a narration of the idea of evolution of sports through time.’

INFORMATION
klabarchitects.com

Architecture and colour have a long and established relationship. Bright geometric pops of colour at Tottenham Court Road Underground station, courtesy of artist Daniel Buren and part of Hawkins/Brown’s redevelopment; the muted colours of Morris + Company’s models for its Sylvan Heritage project in Kent; and the vivid stripes of Charles Holland Architects' Polly pavilion in North Yorkshire – colours lend each of these distinctive designs its own idiosyncratic character. The emotive role of colour and its power to be both joyful and inclusive has long held architects and designers engaged, and is now the subject of a new digital exhibition organised by the Museum of Architecture, London.

‘Colour Memories’ looks into the sentimental role colour holds for architects, who juggle the personal connotations it can conjure for them with a knowledge of how it will impact design. The exhibition examines the impact of memory and how it works alongside colour’s power to alter perceptions of space, set the ambience, or draw on an intrinsic web of cultural associations.

For Jonathan Hagos of architecture practice Freehaus, salmon orange was the colour of his parents’ Opal Kadett, parked outside the first home he remembers living in. For Catherine Pease of vPPR Architects, soft green recalls the calming hues of plants, and she and her colleagues are drawn to projects that link landscape and architecture. For Harbinder Singh Birdi of Hawkins\Brown Architects, traffic red holds a significance. Paul Monaghan of AHMM finds the distinctive green of a Victorian tile sentimental.

‘Colour is something that helps us recall memories and feelings,' says founder and director of The Museum of Architecture Melissa Woolfrod. ‘The steel blue of the ocean on a windy Autumn's day that gives us chills just thinking of it; bright neon-coloured lights in cities that evoke excitement and energy; and primary-coloured crayons strewn across a table harking back to the nostalgia and innocence of being a child. Narratives like these are driving the Museum of Architecture's Colour Memories exhibition, bringing the personal stories of architects, and the designs they inspire, to life.'

The exhibition, sponsored by Axalta, looks further than nostalgia’s role in colour memory, contemplating how colour informs both the design process and our mood and wellbeing. It nods to recent movements in architecture and design, considering the role of the Multiform movement – characterised by its use of bold colours and themes – and the vibrant New London Fabulous movement, which celebrates colourful design cues from diverse cultures. Twenty architectural practices come together for the digital exhibition, providing a personal exploration of colour’s role in their designs.

INFORMATION
‘Colour Memories’, until October 2021, is a digital exhibition sponsored by Axalta
museumofarchitecture.org

The Biodôme, Montreal's science museum housed in the former 1976 Olympics velodrome, has just been given a thorough and imressive refresh by local architecture studio KANVA. The architects led an extensive redesign of the structure, promoting biophilic design, environmental sustainability, restoration and reuse, and a dynamic, immersive display in a project that transforms the modernist-inspired concrete structure into a 21st century multi-level experience. 

Headed by Rami Bebawi and Tudor Radulescu, who co-founded the practice in 2003, KANVA won an international competition to breathe new life into the tired structure in 2014 – these works part of a wider reworking of the Space for Life complex, which includes the Biôdome, Planetarium, Insectarium, and Botanical Garden. 

‘Our mandate was to enhance the immersive experience between visitors and the museum’s distinct ecosystems, as well as to transform the building’s public spaces, says Bebawi. ‘In doing so, we proudly embraced the role that the Biodôme plays in sensitising humans to the intricacies of natural environments, particularly in the current context of climate change and the importance of understanding its effects.'

A project comprising an existing architectural structure but also complex technical equipment and whole ecosystems of plants, birds, fish and animals, this was a complicated task. The architects led a delicate operation composed of several ‘micro-interventions', in order to achieve their goal.

This included opening up a new core for the Biodôme experience – an open, central space that links all areas and connects the visitor with both the displays and the context, by revealing the dome's spectacular roof structure. High ceilings and skylights bathe the interior with light creating a fascinating shadow play between sun rays and the existing sculptural concrete structure. 

A translucent, biophilic design skin wraps around each of the musuem’s various ecosystems (there are five of them in total, housing more than 250,000 animals and 500 plant species), protecting them and guiding visitors by helping with orientation. ‘It’s a very powerful tool, half a kilometre in length and rising nearly four storeys,' explains Bebawi. ‘It’s extremely emblematic of the space, and the white purity beautifully highlights and contrasts the original structural concrete.' 

Making clever use of an existing structure while injecting biophilic design to bring it to the 21st century, the Biodôme is visually arresting and engaging. ‘We need to reconnect people with the environment, and the Biodôme does that in a refreshing way that we are proud to have contributed to,' adds Bebawi. ‘This project has provided us with six years of invaluable knowledge, preparing us for new and innovative approaches to future projects where architecture becomes a tool to promote and facilitate environmental change.'

INFORMATION

kanva.ca

Israel's Design Museum Holon presents Soft Landscape, a playful installation by multidisciplinary designer Sarit Shani Hay defined by a composition of gentle forms that become home to sea lions, seals and bears.

Specialising in child-centric design, Shani Hay has applied her expertise and creative approach to public and private interiors, furniture, products and toys. ‘My work is motivated by the profound need to reformulate things; I create an aesthetic world around me, using design as an excuse,’ she says. ‘Childhood has been a continuous source of inspiration and serves as the force behind my passion for design. I believe that the environment children grow up in is the ground on which their sensibilities develop, and that childhood should be treasured and celebrated.’

Her installation features architectural, cushioned shapes that reference an imaginary coastline in tones of blue and taupe, upholstered in New Zealand lambswool and created in collaboration with British company Camira Fabrics. The pieces’ sinuous silhouettes are placed in conversation with the curves of Ron Arad’s Design Museum Holon architecture, visible outside the exhibition space.

Animals are a recurring motif in Shani Hay’s work. Throughout her practice, their stylised forms have become toys, furniture and places of relaxation. ‘Sarit Shani Hay uses animals to construct a private, imaginary jungle motivated by an empathic human gaze and a desire to overcome archaic fears,’ says the museum's curator, Maya Dvash. 

Now open at the museum, the installation’s soothing forms come at a fitting time. ‘I started to work on the installation a year ago; it was the beginning of Covid-19 and there was a great feeling of uncertainty and anxiety,’ says Shani Hay. ‘I have become interested in the therapeutic effects of time spent in nature, particularly on children, a feeling that was enhanced during the pandemic. I’ve strived to create spaces that provide a sort of escape, a meditative feeling.’

INFORMATION

Soft Landscape is at Design Museum Holon until 1 June 2021
dmh.org.il
shanihay.com

ADDRESS

Pinkhas Eilon St 8
Holon
5845400
Israel

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The awaited M+ visual culture museum in Hong Kong designed by Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron will open in 2021, it has been announced. The structure – construction now complete – has drawn considerable attention since plans were first announced almost a decade ago.

Located in Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, M+ is the first global museum of contemporary visual culture in Asia dedicated to collecting, exhibiting, and interpreting visual art, design, architecture, and moving image. There will also be a curatorial emphasis on Hong Kong visual culture from across the last two centuries. The museum has already produced a number of off-site and satellite exhibitions, and even an international symposium, but the completion of its ‘forever home' on the Victoria Harbour waterfront is an anticipated development, with the monumental structure long-lauded as one of the museum's most impressive attributes.

The museum – with a total footprint of 65,000 sq m, including 17,000 sq m of exhibition space across 33 galleries – is shaped like a ‘T', with horizontal and vertical volumes intersecting. The slender tower is topped by an expansive podium, offering unobstructed views of the waterfront.

The tower and a second-floor podium (housing much of the exhibition space, intended to create a seamless visitor experience) are formed from concrete structures clad in ceramic tiles that reflect changing light and weather conditions. This is a departure from the predominantly glass and steel façades favoured by nearby skyscrapers. The tower façade also features an LED display system, which will broadcast content from and related to the museum, adding a sense of interactivity to the already electric Hong Kong skyline.

Jacques Herzog, founding partner of Herzog & de Meuron, says M+ is ‘locally inspired, but at the same time universal and open; it is for the people and visitors across the world’. He articulates that diversity is intrinsic to the museum's DNA. ‘[The museum] best expresses where we should go as a world culture, where diversity, equality, and access to art of all kinds are expressed from the very beginning.'

Herzog & de Meuron – in collaboration with TFP Farrells and Arup – won the coveted design project against keen competition (think: Snøhetta, Renzo Piano Building Workshop and Toyo Ito & Associates) in 2013.

INFORMATION

mplus.org.hk

The Design Museum's ‘Charlotte Perriand: The Modern Life’ showcased the work and ideas of the French architect and designer through a series of thematic displays, presenting her creative process with an impressive series of sketches, photographs, notebooks, as well as furniture design prototypes, final pieces and faithful reconstructions of some of her most famous interiors.

‘Charlotte Perriand: The Modern Life’ at the Design Museum

This new exhibition marked 25 years since Charlotte Perriand’s last exhibition at London’s Design Museum, held in 1996, and was put together in collaboration with the Perriand family and the Fondation Louis Vuitton, with the support of Cassina (whose catalogue includes numerous Perriand furniture reissues), and exhibition design contributions by Assemble and A Practice for Everyday Life. 

‘Charlotte Perriand was a hugely influential figure in design,’ said Design Museum chief curator Justin McGuirk. ‘Her life spanned the 20th century and her career reflects the twists and turns of the modernist movement.’ 

The Design Museum exhibition explored her work through three thematic sections, which will help outline Perriand’s design approach: ‘The Machine Age’; ‘Nature and the Synthesis of the Arts’; and ‘Modular Design for Modern Living’. Perriand’s creative transition from a modern machine aesthetic to her preference for natural forms sculpted from wood is chronicled through the show, and this process comes together in her all-encompassing vision of a ‘synthesis of the arts’, where design, art and architecture combine. 

Described as ‘a free spirit who championed design for all’, Perriand subscribed to modernist aesthetics that were reflected in her furniture and architecture designs. She famously said ‘dwellings should be designed not only to satisfy material specifications; they should also create conditions that foster harmonious balance and spiritual freedom in people’s lives’, and the Design Museum exhibition helps bring her ideas back to life. 

Exhibition design and graphics

The Museum collaborated with Assemble for the exhibition design, and A Practice for Everyday life supplied the graphics for the space (and designed the accompanying monograph), including a threedimensional typeface made of bent steel tubes that referenced Perriand's furniture. The exhibition’s bold colour palette reflected Perriand’s own use of colour, and partitions throughout the space frame compositions of her works and interiors spaces. Bespoke folded metal captions were integrated into display surfaces and structures, made of modular concrete blocks.

Charlotte Perriand: her life in art, design and architecture

Perriand was born in Paris in 1903, and studied furniture design at the École de l'Union Centrale des Arts Décoratifs. She came to prominence soon after graduating in 1925, with projects such as the 1927 ‘Bar sous le toit’ (Bar under the roof) created for her own apartment-studio in Paris’ Saint-Sulpice. This minimalist and functional apartment space that she designed for her life and work was faithfully reproduced at the exhibition’s entrance.

Early examples of modular metal furniture, as well as the sketches, models and plans behind the designs formed the core of ‘The Machine Age’. Several vignettes recreated Perriand’s interiors, demonstrating the modernity of her aesthetic and approach to space and living. It was during this time that she started working with Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret, a decade-long collaboration that resulted in furniture pieces such as the 1928 ‘Chaise longue basculante’ or the ‘Fauteil grand confort’ from the same year, as well as several interiors, including an installation proposing single-room living at the Salon d’Automne in 1929. 

In the 1930s, Perriand’s interest shifted from metal furniture and industrialised production towards nature, and her artistic work took a turn in this direction. Brilliantly exemplified through ‘Nature and the Synthesis of the Arts’, this shift included organic furniture forms in wood and leather, inspired by personal collections of found natural objects such as rocks, sticks and fossils. The exhibition included black and white photography and experimental sketches; mixed with furniture from the time, these give a sense of how these inspirations were translated through Perriand’s sensibility.

‘Modular Designs for Modern Living’ forms a synthesis of Perriand’s trajectory through modernity, and shows her work in modular furnishings, interior design and architecture. She strived to create affordable and adaptable interiors, and some of her best known furniture works include bookcase designs originally conceived for student dormitories – a fitting example of democratic design, featuring a simple, modular construction in wood and plastic. The exhibition culminates with the legendary work for the French ski resort Les Arcs in 1968, with a life-sized model and a film that helps visitors immerse themselves in her pragmatic design thinking. 

Perhaps most poetically, the show’s last item on display demonstrates Perriand’s curiosity and humour. It’s a vase she had bought in Brazil in the 1960s, made from an everyday plastic bottle that, she had said, captured the essence of good design to be resourceful, intelligent and infused with humanity. 

‘The last time Perriand had an exhibition at the Design Museum, in 1996, she was concerned at first that she was being presented as a furniture designer,’ says McGuirk. ‘Twenty-five years later, there is no risk of any misunderstanding. Here, she is presented as a synthesiser, a collaborator, an integrator. A Perriand interior remains kind of ideal, a harmony of contrasts and disciplines that is difficult to replicate. And it is this ideal that she offered as a framework to those who wished to live a modern life, like her own.’

INFORMATION

‘Charlotte Perriand: The Modern Life' is at the Design Museum, London, 19 June-5 September 2021

designmuseum.org

ADDRESS

224-238 Kensington High Street
London W8 6AG

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Antwerp's majestic Royal Museum of Fine Arts – also known as KMSKA – is about to reopen its doors after a transformation and update by Dutch architecture practice KAAN Architecten. This includes a brand new wing with a series of minimalist rooms. Now, the building, a generous, historic late 19th century structure, has been thoroughly restored and extended, now offering more and better spaces to experience art. 

The venue, which was originally designed by Jacob Winders and Frans van Dyck, was conceived as a ‘daylight museum', explains the team at KAAN. This means, it was a building to be experienced as ‘a promenade surrounded by stunning artworks as well as the external landscape, witnessed through its multiple lookouts over the city and the inner patios.' 

Respecting the existing structure's intention, the architects hid all alterations and extension within the existing volumes. So, from the outside, one would never anticipate the heritage building was ever changed at all. Once stepping inside though, visitors encounter KAAN's masterful, minimalist signature style, which has been adapted to fit the 19th century building. 

The museum's masterplan, the architects say, is now divided into three main areas. There is a public entrance area, the central exhibition spaces and offices (which the team dubs ‘feel, see and work' spaces, respectively). Old merges effortlessly with the new, respectfully blending periods and styles in a functional and appropriate manner. This allows the institution's rich art collection to take centre stage. 

A brand new 21st century gallery space is located at the building's heart, replacing four patios. It consists of a series of bright, white halls composed of sharp plastered surfaces and bespoke marble furniture. The contrast between this wing's minimalist rooms and the existing galleries makes the addition clear and signifies the contemporary work to be displayed there. It also highlights and celebrates the museum's heritage value through juxtaposition

INFORMATION

kaanarchitecten.com

Designer Adam D. Tihany has created a new look for Italian cruise ship company Costa Smeralda, and his latest project for the brand includes a museum of Italian design aboard a ship. And while we might not find ourselves aboard a cruise ship in the very near future, we can dream of our next trip with a side of design.

Tihany and his team worked closely with the Italian company as well as with a series of international designers such as David Rockwell and Rodolfo Dordoni, to bring the theme of ‘Italy’s Finest’ to life. The team selected furniture from Italian manufacturers from Poltrona Frau to Flos and Kartell, to enhance what Tihany calls the ‘Made in Italy sensibility’ of each space aboard the ship. 

Alongside the sophisticated interiors, the ships will feature the museum displays, celebrating iconic italian design. The displays feature legendary items from Italian design history, from fashion and furniture to film and transportation, with featured brands including Paola Lenti, Molteni, Moroso, Cassina, Emu, TechnoGym and more. ‘The CoDe collection is intended as a tribute to the history of Italian-made excellence, celebrating the ongoing global influence of Italian creativity. The museum exemplifies the ship’s theme, Italy’s finest, showing guests some of the most iconic moments in Italian design history,’ reads a Costa Smeralda statement.

Italian architect Matteo Vercelloni, former Professor of History of Design at Milan’s Politecnico, is curating the displays, devising a space that is an interactive ‘walkthrough’ installation to captivate visitors. 

‘Unlike any other passageway onboard, the museum’s highly contemporary stainless steel portal meets the unique design challenges of the space with a series of arches lit from the inside,’ commented Tihany. ‘As the rings of the tunnel separate, guests can veer off the pathway to explore the exhibition spaces to the right and left of the arches. Whether just passing through or lingering over the collection, the CoDe will enrich the guest experience by celebrating Italy’s Finest in design.’

INFORMATION 

tihanydesign.com

Teo Yang Studio has given the lobby and gallery at the Gyeongju National Museum’s Silla History wing a thorough refresh, mixing its own contemporary aesthetic and minimalist architecture with notes from the country's rich heritage. Drawing on Korean culture, the design team worked on interpreting historical elements for the 21st century in a space that feels sophisticated, serene and welcoming. 

‘The design of the Silla History Gallery lobby aims to prove that the age-old artifacts kept in the museum can still inspire the contemporary design of the 21st century,' explains firm principle Teo Yang. 

Following this concept, the geometric patterns of earthenware from the Silla Dynasty have been re-imagined as decorative wood elements for the lobby; and the dynasty's extravagant style and luxurious precious metal ornaments have inspired the bespoke bronze lighting elements and ceiling mirrors the studio created. 

As with all Teo Yang's work, a minimalist approach that favours perfection of detail and craft dominates. This elevates even the smallest fitting to a museum-quality piece. A sense of calmness and spatial symmetry were equally important and underpin the design solution. 

The lobby, specifically, ‘was designed to express three main messages,' say the architects. Firstly, it functions as a space that prioritises emotional connection; then, it provides rest within an area that promotes health and is surrounded by art; and lastly, it offers a new way of viewing the centuries-old artifacts on display. 

Carefully placed furniture throughout ensures visitors can take the time to enjoy the works on show at their own pace, in a peaceful but fascinating environment. ‘We hope that the Buddha statues placed at both ends of the space, together with the scenery of Gyeongju’s Namsan Mountain, will create a mesmerising experience,' says Teo Yang.

INFORMATION

teoyangstudio.com

The Board of Directors of Milan’s Fondazione Triennale has announced the appointment of Wallpaper* Milan Editor Marco Sammicheli as curator of the Design, Fashion and Crafts for the Triennale, as well as Triennale Design Museum Director

A design critic and curator, Sammicheli has been part of the Wallpaper* team since 2017, working on strengthening the brand’s relationship with Italian companies and institutions, and taking part in editorial and commercial projects for the magazine and digital platform. 

Sammicheli has also worked as a design educator at Politecnico di Milano and Shenkar College of Design and Engineering and in Tel Aviv. As a curator, his exhibitions include ‘Designing the Sacred’ at the Venice International Architecture Exhibition in 2014, 1+1+1 at Assab One, and a show of previously unseen watercolours by Steven Holl presented at Antonia Jannone gallery in 2018. Sammicheli was also part of the curatorial team for the 2017 exhibition Italian Beauty, on the career of Italian architect Mario Bellini.

In his new role, Sammicheli will oversee the museum’s exhibitions, collaborate on the institution’s design research and grow the permanent collections. He follows on from Joseph Grima, who will remain part of the Triennale working on the 23rd International Exhibition scheduled for 2022.

The Museum was established in 2019, as part of Triennale Director Stefano Boeri's transformation of the Milan institution, and is an integral part of its cultural hub. Home to a 1600-piece strong permanent design collection, it regularly collaborates with leading designers and design brands to expand its offering. ‘Marco Sammicheli's appointment as Superintendent of the Museo del Design Italiano, and his presence within the scientific committee of the Triennale Foundation, affirm the important role of the Museum for the Milan Triennale's future,' says Boeri. ‘Especially looking forward to the extraordinary opportunity given by the [upcoming] International exhibition.'

‘I am grateful to president Stefano Boeri and the board for their trust; I will work to implement the collection of the Museum as well as concentrate on temporary exhibitions dedicated to storytelling and promotion of Italian design,' says Sammicheli. ‘I will also continue my work as International Relations Chief Officer, promoting the pavilions for the 2022 International Exhibition'.

Sarah Douglas, Wallpaper* Editor-in-Chief, comments: ‘I am delighted for Marco – he is so deserving of this important and influential position. He has been such a huge asset to the Wallpaper* family and I can’t wait to see all the brilliant things he brings to the Triennale.'

INFORMATION

triennale.org

In one of the year’s most anticipated cultural launches, Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts is about to celebrate the inauguration of the Nancy and Rich Kinder Building. Designed by Steven Holl Architects, this is the latest addition to an expanding museum campus, which also includes Holl’s Glassell School of Art, completed in 2018.

The new structure, a balanced composition of irregularly shaped, white and translucent volumes topped by luminous, concave roofs, features bright, dynamic interiors, created to house generously modern and contemporary art. The building is arranged horizontally, spanning two levels, and generous, naturally top-lit galleries are interspersed with courtyards, connecting inside and outside.

A cascading sculptural staircase that links lobby and gallery areas on all levels is a key centrepiece in the composition. ‘The atrium is very dramatic and I feel will likely become an iconic example in 21st museum architecture, in the same way the Guggenheim in Bilbao or New York is,’ says the museum’s director Gary Tinterow. This is an expressive building that is singular and the interior is very exciting. Our galleries are full of character, they are not the typical white box.’ Lighting design by L’Observatoire International enhances the space throughout. 

The building will open officially on 21 November with the first comprehensive installation from the museum’s international collections, including in particular Latin American and Latino art; photography; prints and drawings; decorative arts, craft, and design; and modern and contemporary art. 

A version of this article originally featured in the November issue of Wallpaper*

INFORMATION

stevenholl.com

Rimini is about to bear the cultural fruit of a productive combination of public policy, a local sense of civic responsibility and a strong architectural vision. This mini-metropolis on Italy’s Riviera Romagnola, known as the country’s party capital and the home town of Federico Fellini, is opening the doors to a new contemporary art museum. PART, or Palazzi dell’Arte Rimini, is an adaptation and renovation project by Milan based architect Luca Cipelletti. It is housed in two medieval buildings in the city’s main square - the 13th Century Palazzo dell’Arengo and the 14th Century Palazzo del Podestà.

The project has a remarkable grassroots origin story. The hills surrounding Rimini have been home to some of Europe’s most legendary discos, but also to the San Patrignano Community – a dedicated, hard-working, drug rehabilitation centre operating since 1978 for men and women. This community later established itself as a foundation. Thanks to its efforts and to charitable donations of numerous works of contemporary art over the years, it has built up an eclectic and ambitious collection. 

According to a new endowment model for Italy, artworks donated to a foundation that cannot be loaned for long periods, need instead to be made accessible to the public. This provided the City of Rimini with the opportunity to create itself a new art museum.

The restoration of the two historic buildings was only part of Cipelletti’s task. He also had to completely rethink the rooms as spaces for art, for example, ensuring there are extra surfaces for exhibition space and hanging. ‘My aim was to enhance the impressive medieval volumes, but avoid reconstructing new elements in the historical style,' he says. ‘I wanted to bring out the precious original elements, such as the materials, the Palladian wooden trusses, the large polifora windows. The interventions of technical modernisation, the paint colours on the surfaces, the flooring and the fixtures all express a balance between a contemporary aesthetic language and its historic counterpart.'

The art museum, including the ticket office and café, occupies two levels. Spatial fexibility, which allows the architecture to transform into any interior needed for each show, was key. Cipelletti, inspired from Italian masters such as BBPR, Carlo Scarpa and Franco Albini, designed the space so that the galleries place the art at centre stage. Yet it also offers the visitor visual rhythm, as well as opportunities to pause and reflect.

New, freestanding walls create additional wallspace for displays, navigating the structures' large windows. There are newly installed, near-invisible, bronze window frames; flooring and bespoke furniture in durmast oak; and plinths in stone from San Marino. The last is the same material that was used in medieval times but, seeing as it can no longer be quarried, it was recovered from an old warehouse and reused.

Attention to detail and material use, both original and contemporary, a sense of perspective and a ‘less is more' attitude guided the architect’s hand through the development of all interiors. The project is completed by a lighting concept by designer Alberto Pasetti Bombardella and a site-specific piece by artist David Tremlett.

INFORMATION

ar.ch.it

Terunobu Fujimori’s teahouses literally grow on trees. The Japanese architect builds poetic sites of ceremonial encounters into the forks and onto the trunks of trees. Now the 73-year-old is inviting fans of environmentally-aware modern architecture to tea at the Hombroich rocket station.

Gliding through the pine trees, a winding path studded with single stone slabs end up in a small clearing. Look up, and there it is – the latest teahouse by Japanese architect Terunobu Fujimori. At three metres high, sitting on stilts and made of pitch black Robinia wood, the treehouse is reached by 19 steps within a narrow metal staircase. It was specially designed for the Hombroich Rocket Station, Europe's first permanent, now disused, NATO missile base, which was adapted into an art project by collector Karl-Heinrich Müller in 1994.

The black colour of the teahouse façade is a result of the carbonisation process of the wood. ‘The traditional method, by which the wood is blackened by subjecting it to a few minutes of fire, is called Yakisugi and is typical for Fujimori's work,' says Frank Boehm, the curator of the project and the accompanying exhibition. ‘It protects the wood from the weather and damage by insects.'

In the oval of the interior, the walls are panelled with oak. Any geometric formality is broken up, and a trompe-l’œil effect makes the roof appear to curve inwards. Traditionally, Japanese teahouses are laid out with tatami floor mats, but here visitors sit on an organically-shaped bench in a semicircle. Before them, the hearth for tea-making is inset into the table.

As usual, where possible Fujimori uses natural materials. Everything appears to be handmade expressing Wabi-Sabi, the beauty of the irregular, which is a design principle of the master builder. A kidney-shaped sliding window opens to the south with handmade, leaded windowpanes. It reveals an unobstructed view of three large pine trees and the Lower Rhine landscape beyond.

‘When designing teahouse architecture, you have to create a separate world that is distinct from everyday life. The key is to let something float above the ground,' says Terunobu Fujimori. Like the traditional Japanese teahouses, his buildings serve as places of contemplation and cultivated encounters, yet Fujimori’s designs undermine every architectural canon.

You can search in vain for straight lines and coherent geometries in his work. Instead, he uses pencils and crayons to draw surreal, fantastic buildings that could have been lifted straight out of an anime film, a Hieronymus Bosch painting, or even a Gallic village. His works echo rustic dwellings, perched precariously in the forks of trees or on high stilts. It is almost as if this free-spirited man is fulfilling his childhood dreams through designing escapist tea-tree-houses.

Fujimori, who is one of the most significant architectural historians in Japan, did not begin working as an architect until 1990. Yet in the last three decades, he has constructed about one or two buildings a year, including numerous tearooms and teahouses. These have been mostly for private clients, including his first teahouse Ishiya-tei (House For One Night) for the former Japanese Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa. ‘After its completion, for the first time, I didn’t want to part with a house,' Fujimori says, recalling the awakening of his passion for building teahouses. 

As a result, he started to build three teahouses on his own property in Chino, Nagano Prefecture: Takasugi-an, the Too-High Teahouse, Hikusugi-an, the Too-Low Teahouse and Soratobu dorobune, the Flying Mudboat. Today, there are about a dozen permanent teahouses worldwide, and no two are alike. ‘Because of their distinct personality, teahouses have something human-like about them. That’s why they have names like people,' says Fujimori, showing evidence of his wry humour. He christened the teahouse on the island of Hombroich the ‘Ein Stein Haus' (One-Stone-House). The idea of a single stone has a special meaning in Zen Buddhism, in which it symbolises an island around which waters rush, providing peace and harmony. At the same time, his first permanent teahouse in Germany is a homage to the great German physicist of the same name, Albert Einstein. Now visitors can reflect on their own philosophical outlooks, while sipping Matcha tea and floating above the world, as if detached from gravity, space and time.

In the teahouse, says Fujimori, there is no hierarchy and no status. This has been true in Japan for thousands of years. Whether samurai, merchant or farmer, in the teahouse everyone sat at one table and was treated as equal. Fujimori likes this idea. But he wants more – he not only wants to bring people closer together, but also to bring them closer to nature. With his deeply-rooted lightness of touch, in Hombroich he has pulled it off once again.

INFORMATION

The accompanying exhibition ends on November 29, 2020

inselhombroich.de

London’s Design Museum unveils the projects created by its Designers in Residence 2021. The group of four designers, operating across different fields, were supported by the museum to develop a project based on the particularly timely theme of ‘Care’.

The Design Museum programme, now in its 13th iteration, aims to support designers at the start of their career, giving them financial and practical means, as well as industry assistance, to develop crucial work. This year, Enni-Kukka Tuomala, Abiola Onabule, Cynthia Voza Lusilu and Ioana Man have been selected to create new work with the support of the museum, and their design explorations will look to improve some of the social and environmental challenges we are facing today. 

Designers in Residence at the Design Museum

This is an important time for creatives to think about how our post-pandemic world can be shaped by design, looking at technology, human relations, the environment and self-care. ‘At a time of upheaval and tragedy, design has shown itself to be up to the task of equipping us to face adversity, with designers manufacturing vital PPE and other equipment during the pandemic,’ says Priya Khanchandani, the Design Museum’s head of curatorial and interpretation. ‘In a post-Covid environment, it is more important than ever that we support emerging designers whose work has the capacity to solve problems, grow empathy and build bridges of understanding.’

The multidisciplinary, all-female quartet represents a new generation of creative thinkers particularly equipped to face the present and future challenges through their diverse specialisms. ‘Right now, it is imperative that designers are engaged in conversations about Forest Empathy/Understanding the Perspectives of Trees.care as we enter a period of greater social, political and ecological uncertainty. These designers are proposing tools and systems to help us navigate this landscape,’ says Sumitra Upham, the Designers in Residence project curator.

Enni-Kukka Tuomala

London-based Finnish designer and artist Enni-Kukka Tuomala’s work ‘is focused on fostering issue-based cross-cultural empathy’, which she has addressed through projects such as the Empathy Chamber and Campaigns for Empathy in London and Cambridge.

At the Design Museum, Tuomala focused on developing an immersive ‘empathy training programme’, which resulted in her ‘Forest Empathy’ project, exploring the relationship between humans and trees. For the project, Tuomala created a film to reveal ‘the complex personalities and perspectives of forests’; an Empathy Ecosystem reflecting on the role of empathy in human (and non-human) life; and a tour of the trees local to the Design Museum – an invitation to visitors to connect with London’s urban forests. 

Abiola Onabule

Fashion designer Abiola Onabule’s garments are inspired by her Nigerian heritage. Through her residency, Onabule considered the stories of West African women living in the UK to investigate how the exchange of skills and craftsmanship techniques can become an important act of care and conversation. 

Onabule focused on adire, a Yoruba technique for indigo dyeing: in her collection, adire is used to explore the use of West African textile design in contemporary fashion. Through her project, Onabule has also produced a film reflecting on care, looking at local and ‘slow’ production and the conversations around the cultural importance of cloth.

Cynthia Voza Lusilu

Paris-born Cynthia Voza Lusilu’s design research work has had a focus on care from the start of her practice – ‘put care first, always’, reads her personal manifesto. ‘My recent research is centred around ways of engaging with people through community-based participatory practices. I explore care and repair as vehicles to support emotional wellness and sense of place,’ she says of her work.

Titled BALM (Black Alliance for Lewisham Minds), her project at the Design Museum focuses on how design can support mental health in Black British communities. Voza Lusilu collaborated with a team of mental health professionals, urban planners and Black residents from the London borough of Lewisham to design a series of supportive tools. The tools include care packages and an online platform intended to become a support system to promote resilience and the creation of healing spaces. 

Ioana Man

Multidisciplinary designer Ioana Man’s work revolves around architecture, set design and critical practice with a focus on science and biology. Through her Design Museum residency, Man wanted to develop ways to protect ecosystems impacted by architectural planning and modern construction practices, to focus communities around urban nature. 

With the use of new scientific technology, she created a series of interactive digital walks that help imagine a future where agriculture is integrated into urban life, with food gardens forming an important asset for the life of both humans and microbes. 

‘Embarking on their residency, this year's all-female cohort faced the crucial challenge of considering the question of “care”,’ says Khanchandani. ‘A cause that was long obscured by the pursuit of more, and has now been thrown into stark relief.’

INFORMATION 

See the designers’ projects at designersinresidence.designmuseum.org

In the suburbs of Shanghai, in Chonggu Town, a new museum celebrates the birthplace of Shanghai's ancient culture and the history of the Fuquan Mountain culture. Working within the remains of historic architecture, Shenzhen based architecture studio Horizontal Design carefully balanced renovation with new building design to create a voluminous collection of concrete forms that organically grows from the existing historic architecture.

Recently, efforts have been made to restore and revive the Zhang Yan Village, which dates back to the Tang and Song dynasties and appears in Chinese literature and cultural history. Across the village, new design projects are taking place to embrace its past, while updating it for contemporary uses too, so old and new can co-exist.

To start their design process for the museum, the architects researched and analysed the existing site. Several structures – the Village History Hall and the dilapidated Zhang Family’s House – formed the starting point for the new design, and closely neighbouring buildings such as a local temple, defined the spatial and aesthetic qualities of the design too.

On the site was a former family home dating back to the Qing dynasty. While it was in a state of disrepair, the architects chose to preserve what was left, and built a respectful addition to create one of the exhibition halls on the same footprint. The new architecture was slightly offset, so it appears to float within the ruin. The design follows the traditional atrium typology with inward sloping roofs, echoing the life of the former structure.

The better preserved Village History Hall was given a full renovation – the wooden load-bearing structure was repaired and revealed and partition walls were removed, so the original atrium space can again be celebrated. An anodized aluminium flooring, chosen to resist humidity, was laid throughout the exhibition halls, so there is consistency throughout the museum.

Further research revealed another historic building to the north, so a third exhibition hall was built on this footprint. Anodized aluminium was used for the flooring and ceiling, so this space feels more contemporary than the first two spaces.

Between the new volumes, bamboo plants and a water feature create a calming oasis for the community to enjoy. A grey brick masonry wall encloses the space forming a sheltered courtyard.