Steven Holl Architects, in collaboration with Marcela Steinbachová and SKUPINA Studio, have won first place in the international competition of the Terezín Ghetto Museum in Czech Republic. Founded in 1780 as a military fortress, Terezín served as a Jewish Ghetto during World War II where an estimated 33,000 people died. The existing Terezín Ghetto Museum honors individuals who have lost their lives with a new design that is set to serve as a memorial of hope and light.
Chosen among 22 international teams, the winning design, dubbed Tower of Light, is a contemplative space that offers visitors an immersive experience of spectral light phenomena from daylight. The light is refracted into a spectrum of colors, resembling the "colors of humanity", which also glow at night as a "beacon through the darkness".
The Tower of Light is a hopeful new presence in the center of Terezín, towering above the surrounding buildings toward the sky. The design also includes a renovation of the existing museum, an exhibition space, new parks, green spaces surrounding the site, updated parking, and a new information center.
The project is a nod to “Moon Landscape,” a drawing made by Petr Ginz. Born in Prague on February 1, 1928, Ginz was deported to the Terezín concentration camp where he made this imaginative drawing of Earth from the moon. In 1944, Ginz was deported to Auschwitz and was gassed to death at the age of sixteen.
The design team includes Veronika Tichá, Jan Mojka, Marie Harigelová, Michael Haddy, Talya Polat, Obrazek.org + Michal Nohejlas associate architects, David Korecký as exhibition concept designer, Vladimir Pavlovič as construction consultant, and Jan Sulzer and Lada Veselá as landscape designers.
