A jury representing the Mumbai City Museum has selected Steven Holl Architects as the winner of an international competition to design the museum's new wing.
Designboom reports that the jury included the director of London’s L&A Museum, and that it was selecting for Mumbai’s first international architectural competition for a public building. Other competitors included Zaha Hadid, OMA, and Amanda Levete.
The winning design involves building 125,000 sf of floor space, to be developed in white concrete and bringing in exactly 25 lumens of daylight to each gallery, Designboom reports.
At the center of the plan is a massive pool that will generate 60% of the museum’s electricity through photovoltaic cells underneath the water’s surface.
According to Designboom, Steven Holl Architects will now develop the initial design together with local practice Opolis Architects. Guy Nordenson & Associates will serve as structural engineers and Transsolar as sustainability consultants. Construction is expected to begin next year.
Steven Holl released the following news on the project:
Steven Holl was selected unanimously from 8 finalists including Zaha Hadid, OMA and Amanda Levete, to design a new wing for the Mumbai City Museum, also known as Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum.
The jury included Martin Roth, director of the V&A Museum in London, Tasneem Mehta, Managing Trustee & Honorary Director of the Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum, Homi Bhabha, Director of the Mahindra Humanities Center at Harvard, Sen Kapadia, architect at Sen Kapadia Associates and founding director of the Kamala Reheja Vdyanidhi Institute for Conceptual Architecture in Mumbai, among other leading professionals of the museum world and academia.
Mumbai's oldest museum garden in Byculla will have a 125,000 sq ft new wing. The Mumbai City Museum's North Wing addition is envisioned as a sculpted subtraction from a simple geometry formed by the site boundaries.
The concept of "Addition as Subtraction" is developed in white concrete with sculpted diffused light in the 65,000 sq ft new gallery spaces. Deeper subtractive cuts bring in exactly twenty-five lumens of natural light to each gallery.
The basically orthogonal galleries are given a sense of flow and spatial overlap from the light cuts. The central cut forms a shaded monsoon water basin which runs into a central pool, related to the great stepped well architecture of India.
The central pool joins the new and old in its reflection and provides sixty percent of the museum's electricity through photovoltaic cells located below the water's surface. The white concrete structure has an extension of local rough-cut Indian Agra stone. The circulation through the galleries is one of spatial energy, while the orthogonal layout of the walls foregrounds the Mumbai City Museum collections.
Related Stories
Multifamily Housing | Sep 27, 2017
Pickleball, anyone?
Two-and-a-half million Americans are playing the game with the funny name.
Architects | Sep 25, 2017
Blending past, present, and future at a research center
The four-part mission of a garden of scientific research helped drive the design for the Beijing New Material Research & Development Center.
Architects | Sep 22, 2017
Design giants merge: FKP joins CannonDesign
The deal strengthens CannonDesign’s pediatric healthcare expertise, establishes presence in Texas and Ohio.
40 Under 40 | Sep 22, 2017
Meet the 40 Under 40 Class of 2017
These AEC stars are making their mark in business, philanthropy, and in their communities.
40 Under 40 | Sep 21, 2017
Meet the 40 Under 40 Class of 2017
These AEC stars are making their mark in business, philanthropy, and in their communities.
Office Buildings | Sep 20, 2017
Five Stantec offices move into one Fifth Avenue location
The new location provides the firm with 40,000 sf of space.
Architects | Sep 19, 2017
What we talk about when we talk about placemaking
What does Good Growth mean and how do we set about achieving it?
Architects | Sep 13, 2017
Leo A Daly hires hospitality-design veteran to lead its Dallas office
Ken Martin views this sector as an incubator of innovation.
Museums | Sep 8, 2017
CAF announces plans for 20,000-sf Chicago Architecture Center to be built on East Wacker Drive
The Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill-designed space will open in summer 2018.
Architects | Sep 6, 2017
Fake architect caught in ‘Operation Vandelay Industries’ sentenced to 2 1/3 to 7 years in prison
The fake architect must also pay a $115,000 restitution.